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and performed the law for us, as a law fimply, or a rule of holiness and righteoufnefs, as if these were not duties incumbent upon us; no doubt they are duty, as well as there are promises of them in the gofpel to bring them forth. I know none that can affert any fuch Antinomian pofitions, as thus diffolve the obligation of the moral law; yet I affert, that Christ hath even freed us from thefe, as the proper pleadable condition for juflification and eternal life before God *; and that his fanctification, righteoufnefs, and merit is the only proper pleadable condition, and ground of all that grace and falvation that lies in the promife, and upon which it is made fure and faft to his people the children of promife; "My covenant fhall fiand faft with him," Pfal. lxxxix. 28. This is that foundation of faith laid in Zion, as fufficient for all the hearers of the gofpel, to build their hope and confidence upon for falvation, Ifa. xxviii. 16. Rom. ix. 33. 1 Pet. ii. 6. 1 Cor. iii. 11. "Other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid, which is Jefus Chrift." Hence, as Chrift is promised for a covenant of the people, fo the promises are faid to be made to him, Gal. iii. 16.: and to be all yea and amen in him, 2 Cor. i. 20. : and the whole covenant of grace is called a promise of grace in Christ, 2 Tim. i. I.; and thus given to us. Hence, of confequence,

5. It is a free and abfolute promife to us, and unconditional it is freely given; "Whereby are given to us exceeding great and precious promises," 2 Pet. i. 4. All the great things of the promife are freely given, and thefe are, Chrift, and all things with him freely, Rom. viii. 32. Though the use of means is required both of finners, and faints, and though we be under a command and obligation to faith, repentance, and all other duties and graces; yet the covenant of grace is such a free, abfolute, and unconditional promife, wherein the Spirit of grace is promifed fo freely, that no act or deed of ours is the condition thereof. There is a con

*This fubje&t is largely treated of, and fet in a clear light, Vol. II. Serm. XXXIII.

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dition of order and connection betwixt one covenantbleffing and another, they being like fo many links of a chain clofed within each other: and hence many promifes are expreffed, as it were, in a conditional way, in the difpenfation of the gospel; whereupon many mistake this matter, while they diftinguish not betwixt the difpenfation of the covenant, and the tenor of the covenant itfelf, wherein grace and glory, and all, is promifed freely. The covenant of promife cannot be properly conditional to us; otherwife, wo would be to us, whofe condition is nothing but fin and mifery by nature this covenant ftands upon abfolute foundations; fuch as the electing grace of the Father, the redeeming grace of the Son, and the applying grace of the Holy Ghoft. They are all abfolutely free and unconditional; there is no fpiritual act of ours previous to the application of the covenant of promife. The Spirit coming to work faith, by his creating power, is promifed abfolutely in the covenant; "Thy people fhall be willing in the day of thy power: They fhall look to him whom they have pierced:" faith is caft out of the womb of the abfolute promife, and begotten by it.— And, indeed, there is not a conditional promife in all the Bible, but what is reductively abfolute; because both the thing promifed, and the condition of it, is contained in the womb of the abfolute promife. Some worthy divines make faith the condition of the covenant; but their found explication of what they mean, fhews they dare not make it the proper condition. If any that pretend to foundness do fo, they but expofe their darkness, and difcover their mistake concerning the covenant of grace, which is a free promife in Chrift Jefus faith itself, and all the bleffings that attend and follow it, being free and abfolutely promifed. Indeed, conditions on our part, properly fo called, would deftroy the nature of the gofpel, which is a free promife. Where is the freedom of grace, if conditional? It would turn the gofpel to the law, and the free covenant of grace to the conditional covenant of works: yea, it would thus deftroy the peace of the poor humbled finner; for when he thinks there is fuch and fuch

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a. condition that must be fulfilled by him before he hath a right to meddle with the promife, then he stands a-back, he dares not believe, because he fuppofes he wants this and that condition and qualification; and fo his legal dream hardens his heart against the gofpel, and fofters his unbelief, to the dishonour of God, and to his own ruin.But if he could fee the promise free and abfolute, "Without money and without price," and there is no condition in this covenant, but Chrift's obedience unto death, which is performed to God's fatisfaction, then a door is open to him to plead for all upon this ground, faying, Lord, give me faith, for Christ's fake; give me repentance, for Chrift's sake ; give me grace, for Chrift's fake; who hath performed the condition of all the grace of the new covenant, and through whom all the promifes run out freely. that clogs the gofpel-offer with fo many terms and conditions, is like a man, as I noticed on a former occafion, offering a cup of wine to a friend, but he makes it fcalding hot upon the fire, that his friend dare not touch it with his lip, left he be burnt. It is the fpecial property of the promife, that it is free, and abfolute, and unconditional to us and if it were not fo, none would believe at all; for, if faith itself were a proper condition, then the grand objection is, Oh! but I cannot believe why, if faith be not abfolutely promifed, there is no relief in that ftrait, the gospel could not be a joyful found to finners that are humbled to fee their want of faith, but only to them that are believers, and have faith already; and fo it were needlefs to preach the gofpel to any but believers: but faith, as well as other bleffings, being freely promifed, unbelievers may put in for a fhare of this free-grace; " Whofoever will, let him come, and take of the water of life freely." And it is this free offer and promife that uses to create faith; Faith comes by hearing of it. There fore,

6. It is a powerful and prolific promife; hence the gofpel, which is the promife of Chrift, as the Lord our righteousness, is called the power of God to falvation ; because therein is revealed the righteoufnefs of God,

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from faith to faith, Rom. i. 16, 17. It is the gofpelpromife that is the miniftration of the Spirit, and fo the organ of almighty power and fovereign efficacy for converting fouls, and fo for faving of finners: When God comes, he comes in the promife. But here it may be asked, May not the Lord convey himself in a command, as well as a promife? To which we reply, As the Lord can convey himself gracioufly to us, in a threatening to the devil, fuch as that was, Gen. iii. 15. ; yet there was a fweet promife to our firft parents wrapt up in it, "The feed of the woman fhall bruife the head of the ferpent;" So the Lord can, and many times does, convey himfelf powerfully into the foul by a command; fuch as that, "Look to me and be faved;" or fuch as that, "Fear not, for I am with thee:" but ftill it is fuch a command, as hath the gofpel mixed with it, and a promife wrapt up in the bofom of it, and wherein the Lord undertakes to work what he commands, according to his promife in Chrift: and no command without a relation to the golpel, or the promife, is the channel of faving power; for there is no falvation to a finner but in the virtue thereof; fo that ftill it is the promife that is powerful. and efficacious for begetting children unto God, who are therefore called, The children of promife. But more of this afterwards. In a word, it is an extenfive promife; and this leads me to the laft thing propofed upon this firft general head, and that was,

4thly, To confider the object of the promife, or to whom it belongs. And here three things belong to this purpose concerning the promife. 1. For whom it is defigned. 2. By whom it is poffefl. 3. To whom it is prefented.

1. Who are the objects of the promife, for whom it is defigned; I mean, for whom it is appointed of God from eternity, fo as they fhall reap the faving benefit and obtain all the good that is in it? I anfwer, "The election fhall obtain, tho' the rest be blinded," Rom. ix. 7. Eph. i. 11. And hence all the elect and chofen of God, fuch of them, I mean, as are fubjects capable of actual believing, they, and they only, are brought, by the power of divine grace, to believe the promife, to the

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faving their fouls; "As many as were ordained to eternal life, believed," Acts xiii. 48.; and, "All that the Father hath given me, fhall come to me," John vi. 37. If any think, O! how can this doctrine of particular election agree with the univerfal offer of the gofpel, and the promise thereof? And how is it evident that God deals fairly with men in this matter, feeing fome only are elected and defigned of God to the good of the promife? Why, Sirs, does not God deal fairly, when he tells us plainly what he is doing, and that he designs to fhow his mercy towards fome, and his juftice towards others, Rom. ix. 22, 23.; that he defigns the revelation of Chrift, for the falling and rifing of many in Ifrael; and the gofpel for a favour of life to fome, and of death to others? If a gardener (as a great divine exemplifies it) watering his garden, where there are many weeds; yea, more weeds than herbs, declares that he waters the whole garden, both weeds and herbs together, that he may make them both to come up above ground, and appear what they are, and, after that, that he may pull out the weeds, and fofter the herbs for fpecial ufe; is not this very right, and fair, and reafonable, infomuch that none needs enquire further, why does he water the weeds? Even fo, the church is God's garden, and many reprobate weeds are therein; and when God orders the watering of a gofpel-difpenfation to a mixed multitude of elect and reprobate, declaring that the offer of the gofpel is to both, for the converfion of the elect from their natural enmity, and for bringing to light the hatred and enmity of the reprobate against him and the offer of his grace; is it not fair dealing, and a reafonable anfwer to the cavils of men against the gofpel-offer, God by his word makes it manifeft, that all men, elect and reprobate, are under fin and unbelief, and that no man can come to Chrift in the gospelpromise, unless the Father draw him? And none would come, unless he fhewed mercy on fome. And this manner of proving men, and fhewing them to be what they are, by a common offer of grace unto all, and cafting in the net of the gofpel-promife among them, is a

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