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can enter; they must be shut out from our presence; shut out from Him who is the only light, and therefore dwelling in darkness; shut out from Him who is the only good, and therefore dwelling in everlasting restlessness and misery, amidst wailing and gnashing of teeth."

LALEHAM,

October 7th, 1827.

SERMON V."

ROMANS IX.-XI.

ROMANS, ix. 18.

Therefore hath He mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth.

I SAID that some parts of the Epistle to the Romans related more particularly to the times and circumstances under which they were written, and concerned us now far less nearly. This remark especially applies to the three chapters at which we are now arrived, the ninth, tenth, and eleventh. When St. Paul wrote, the fact of a new church or people of God being established, to which the Gentiles were admitted, and from which the greatest part of the Jews were shut out, was to all the Jews, whether believers in Christ or not, a matter of the greatest astonishment, and as far as regarded the exclusion of their own nation, a matter of the greatest regret. Now after the lapse of nearly eighteen hun

a Two sermons were here, at a later time, united into one.

The parts

in brackets are substitutions of the later date. The notes are from the earlier sermons.

K K

dred years, when the Jews are only a small and scattered handful, and the Church of God has long been made up of Gentiles only, it is impossible for us, who are ourselves Gentiles, to feel either the wonder or the grief expressed by St. Paul for the case of his countrymen; nor are we very anxious to hear a defence of the Providence of God for a dispensation which, to our minds, seems far more to deserve our thankfulness than our complaints.

Besides the general nature of the subject, there is another reason which might make us regard these chapters as less useful than the other parts of the Epistle. It is on them chiefly that have been raised up some of the most unprofitable speculations, and some of the most mischievous disputes that have ever exercised the faculties of men. One can scarcely read these chapters without being haunted by the thorny questions of God's foreknowledge, and election, and reprobation, and man's free will, which have so distracted the peace of the Christian Church, and have led to so great and so many evil consequences. Surely these foolish and unlearned questions which gender strife, can be no fit subject for the Christian minister, who, for his own sake and for that of his hearers, should dwell on nothing from this place but what may be profitable for godliness. If indeed I might judge of others by myself, I might safely leave this matter at rest, as one which has never disturbed my mind, and which I trust, by God's grace, will never do so. But I know that with many persons, of every age and of every condition, it is one which does disturb them; and which rises above all, in the moment of temptation, as one of the Devil's most successful arguments to make them rush into sin with

less resistance, and to lull their consciences to sleep after they have committed it. It will not be, therefore, to bring forward a difficult and vexing question, which might never have harassed the minds of my hearers, if I had not dwelt upon it; it will be rather, with God's assistance, to endeavour, not indeed to explain what cannot be explained, but to show how the practical mischief, and the disturbance of mind arising from it, may be most effectually removed.

[Never could there be a better instance of the mischief of taking the chapters of our present Bibles separately from one another. The ninth chapter never should be read apart from the tenth and eleventh. The three, in fact, are properly one chapter,-one part of the whole Epistle, standing distinct from what goes before and what follows it,-a part interrupting the general subject of the Epistle, and put in from peculiar circumstances existing at the time when it was written. "Put in from peculiar circumstances," and therefore not only of no use to us, but absolutely mischievous, if we take it simply as applicable to ourselves, in the same sense in which the general part of the Epistle is applicable.

But when I speak of this or other portions of Scripture, not being simply applicable to us, I am very far from meaning that they are of no use to us, except as a matter of mere curiosity. I mean, that it takes more trouble, and requires more thought and knowledge to apply it, because it applies not literally, but by analogy. For instance, our Lord's parable of the good Samaritan is literally applicable to us now just as much as to those who first heard it; it teaches to all ages one

simple lesson, that every man in his need has a claim upon our kindness. But the parable of the labourers in the vineyard, having respect to the particular state of the Jews at that time, is applicable to us only by analogy. It becomes mischievous if we take it simply to ourselves, and say that if we turn to God at the eleventh hour, that is, in our old age, we shall receive the same reward as if we had served Him all our lives. For the parable was spoken, not about individuals, but about nations; not about rewards in heaven, but about certain privileges on earth; not as furnishing a general rule of God's government, but as illustrating his dealings in one particular and extraordinary case. What it teaches us is, not to conclude any thing from it as to God's rules of rewarding men, but not to murmur at these rules whatever they are; never to complain that our neighbour is as well off as we, though less deserving for we know not how God deals out His earthly good things; we must leave it to His wisdom to do as He wills with His own.

I have not idly referred to this parable of the labourers; for the likeness between it and these chapters of the Romans is very considerable. They, like it, speak not about individuals, but about nations; not about rewards in heaven, but privileges on earth; not as teaching us a general rule of God's spiritual government, but removing beyond question His dealings, when it is plain by the evidence of facts, that so and so He has dealt. And the lesson conveyed to us is nearly the same also; not, when others are blessed, to murmur that they have not laboured sufficiently; not, when we are punished, to lay the blame upon God, saying that our sins

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