holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." I here observed the view we have of Christ. As looked upon by the generality of mankind, he is disallowed. They slight him. Many openly reject his gospel, and oppose it: others concern not themselves about it. They do not make him the foundation of their hopes. Either they have no foundation at all, no evidences for eternity, or it is some other foundation, and not Christ. But he is chosen of God. So chosen, that the great God has passed a decree, that if ever any sinful creature obtains salvation, it should be through Christ, and as sought by him. If ever the gospel comes to a man, Christ must be acceptable, or he shall not have eternal life. Every other foundation shall undoubtedly fail, and the hail shall sweep it away as a refuge of lies. He is also precious in the sight of God. In this view, "My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." It is pleasant to view Christ as the foundation of his Church: in this view also the eyes of the Lord are upon him. cious to every believer, incomparably so. to him as for something that passes between Christ and the real Christian. He speaks to his Lord, speaks to him from the heart. And is built up as a spiritual house, and as lively stones. This of natural buildings would be absurd, not so in spiritual. The building of the Father of Spirits is a spiritual building. Spirits are active in it. It is their language! Lord, let me be laid as a stone in thine house, and be one of those whom thou wilt condescend to inhabit as thy temple.' The simile is then changed, and Christians are répresented as a holy priesthood in this house, to offer up spiritual sacrifices to God through Christ. They are priests. They shall be so above. They are so now, and as such holy; they desire to separate themselves from all impurities of flesh and spirit. And they attend to offer prayers, praises, and alms-deeds. They are spiritual in He is also pre- all; all is done in the name and fear of God, from a true spiritual principle which engages the heart. And they are acceptable to God; but it is all through Christ. He is the Aaron, the representative of the whole body. And they are chosen in him. And they shall at length be made priests to keep God's charge, for he will, as in the promise to Joshua, give them a place among them that stand by. Glorious hope! In the mean time, let us offer the sacrifice of praise, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks in his name; and commemorate that great priestly act of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which we are consecrated; and that blood through which we have boldness to enter into the holy place. that MEDITATIONS ON THE SACRAMENT, APRIL 8, 1744. HAVING preached on those words in Jeremiah," How shall I put thee among the children," &c. I introduced the ordinance with a meditation on these: "As often as ye eat this bread, &c. ye show forth the Lord's death till he come," in which I mentioned two leading thoughts. There is a showing forth of the death of Christ to ourselves, to affect our own hearts, and to the world, both enemies and friends. To ourselves: we represent it before our own eyes, our thoughts may be fixed upon it and affected with it; that Christ died, and that he died thus: that his body was broken, that his blood was poured out. So miserable were we as to need it. So merciful was our God as to contrive it. So gracious was our blessed Redeemer as to submit to it. Thus were we ransomed: thus our best services were purchased: thus a lasting obligation was laid upon us, an everlasting obligation, which we shall never outlive in this world or in the next. We show it to ourselves in this connexion, because we desire to answer this obligation. We show it forth to others; to all, to the greatest enemies of Christ. We are not ashamed of his cross. We do not desire that his death should be forgotten. It is the language of this action, that Christ died, and we would show it forth in the midst of Jews and Mahometans, though they should deride it. We show it forth to his friends, hoping it will strike their hearts. We call you, who are present, to look up to it, and to consider it. This was our Saviour; and not ours alone, but we trust yours too. Do you not believe it? Do you not consider it? We also show forth this death till he come. It is an ordinance always to be continued in the Church; and the thought of his coming is to be connected with it. It is an ordinance always to continue in the Church. It has continued a great many ages; was instituted probably before the sabbath, before at least that illustrious one, when the Holy Ghost descended from heaven. It will continue to the end. If it be rooted out in one church and nation, it will continue in another till the Lord's day before Christ's appearance. The last day of the Son of Man upon earth! And oh, what a circumstance will that be for Christians not aware of so sudden a change! Having been at the Lord's supper on the preceding sabbath, to see, before the next, our Lord Jesus Christ descending in the clouds of heaven, and to be caught up to meet him. Surely the pleasure of that interview will be augmented by the communion they have had with him on such an occasion as this. We are also to consider this ordinance in connexion with the view of his coming. He will surely and quickly come! Many of our fellow communicants he has come to take to himself. Their places are empty; or rather, we fill them. So will ours be emptied, and filled up, I trust, by successors. Oh, that there may here still be a seed to serve Christ, when you and I are in our graves. Our Lord Jesus Christ will come to judgment, and we shall be "gathered up together to him." It will perhaps be thirteen or fourteen hundred years or more before the mil lennium probably will be ;-but Christ will then remember us, and remember his servants who have already been dead almost two thousand years; nay, the people of God that have been dead much longer. He will lose none, but raise up all. Christ cannot forget, though our names be forgotten in the church below, they with him shall live. O blessed day! In the expectation of this, let us, in obedience to his command, do our part this day towards worthily transmitting this blessed memorial. I had many addresses to the spectators, praying for the absent, especially for those who were either confined at home, or in foreign lands. MEDITATIONS ON THE OPENING THE NEW YEAR, 1745. It was some concern to see how long these meditations have been interrupted, and that I now find myself so straitened for time, considering the other businesses before me, and my delay of rising till the bell rung, that I have not time to pursue that which I have been this morning entering upon in the manner I should have desired. But I have this morning been meditating on the divine goodness to me during the past year; in which I observed the following particulars. God has this year preserved me in an extraordinary state of health, so that my public services have been interrupted but one Lord's day in the whole series of it, and that not by any extreme illness. God has enabled me to go through many acceptable labours. I apprehend that I have preached more than a hundred and twenty times this year. I have also finished my work on The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul, and a good deal of the third volume of the Family Expositor. I have had some opportunities of improving in some branches of knowledge this year; and I have received extraordinary tokens of respect from many worthy persons both at home and abroad, particularly from our Established clergy, which I thankfully acknowledge. God has also preserved my family unbroken by death. I mean that my wife and children have been preserved; for as to my pupils, God has visited me in a most awful manner, taking away those dear and amiable youths, Mr. Parsons, Mr. Gibbs, and Mr. W. besides others who had finished their preparatory studies, all of whom, had they been alive, would have been with me. Mr. is also a fourth, having left me after a few days' stay, and another who would have come is dead; so that my diminished family is five the less by death with respect to the number of my pupils. God has however blessed me in my worldly affairs, so that I think I have, so far as I can judge, even with a smaller family than usual, advanced more in them than in any former year that occurs to my remembrance. I have also been reflecting on the conduct I have maintained towards God in the midst of so many mercies. And I find reason especially to charge myself with two faults; remissness in his worship both secret and social, as to the temper of my heart, though God has been wonderfully gracious to me in visiting me by his Spirit, and that sometimes in an extraordinary manner, in experiences worthy of having been more particularly recorded; and also in negligence as to visits among my people both in town and country, of which the effects have been too apparent. I have been under rebukes both as to my Academy, in its great diminution, so that now I think I have but about twenty-four, which is less by almost one-third than it has generally been; and also with respect to our Church; as the number of its communicants has been little if at all increased this year; fewer indeed having been added than in most years since I have known Northampton, and some agreeable persons taken away by death or other removals; in that respect therefore I think we decline rather than advance; yet the auditories continue generally in a promising state, and our lectures at College Lane seem to VOL. V. H H |