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real perfection and happiness, is that which is SERM. exercised according to the direction of reason II. and wisdom.

On this account principally the gospel is called the law of liberty, it reftores the empire of reason in men, and rescues them from fervitude to their lufts and paffions. It has this denomination on another account, which I may afterwards infift on, namely, as it has abolished the ceremonial-law, a yoke, which St. Peter fays, neither we nor our fathers were able to bear *. This liberty by the gospel is largely explained by the apostle Paul. But St. James, not treating of that fubject particularly, it is reasonable to understand the character as applied by him in a greater latitude. In the ft chap. he has recommended a diligent attention to, and a due improvement of the word of God, that we should receive it with meekness as the ingrafted word which is able to fave us, laying apart all filthiness and fuperfluity of naughtiness; and, then, he defcribes the different forts of hearers, the carelefs, unattentive, unreformed; and the ferious and obedient. The former he compares to a man beholding his natural face in a glass, who foon forgets what manner of man he was. The other, looking ftedfaftly, and with the most earnest attention into the gofpel, is transform'd

* AЯs xv. 10,

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SERM.by the renewing of his mind, and becomes a II. faithful and conftant doer of the will of God. ''Tis in this description he inferts the Character of the law of liberty, which, therefore, I conclude has a reference to the refcuing of men from the power of their vices and corrupt affections, that they may practise pure religion as the proper effect of christianity.

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The connexion of the text stands thus. The apostle had cenfur'd the Jews, to whom he writes, for their partiality in making distinctions among men according to their outward condition, exhorting them to fulfil the royal law, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, which abstracts from all fuch confiderations. To this law we must have an universal respect, not obeying it in one inftance only, but in all, otherwise we shall not be accepted; then follows, fo fpeak ye, and fo do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty, which application plainly points to univerfal obedience as the proper intent of the gofpel, in oppofition to the contrary tendency of our own lufts and paffions.

Indeed St. Paul himself explains the freedom we have obtained by the law of Chrift in this manner; as in the viiith to the Rom. 2d ver. For the law of the Spirit of the Chrift Jefus bath made me free from the law of

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fin and death. What these oppofite laws are, SER M. appears from the preceding chapter, where II. they are called the law of the members, and the law of the mind; the one leading to fin, and holding the foul in captivity to it, which is a moft wretched and cruel flavery; the other directing to that which is good and wellpleafing in God's fight. Now, fince immediately to this is fubjoined that account of the chriftian law, or the law of the fpirit of life in Chrift Jefus, that it makes us free from the law of fin and death, what can the meaning be, but that it reftores the fovereingty of the mind, delivering it from the reign of fin in the mortal body, that henceforth christians should yield themselves unto God, and their members the inftruments of righteoufnefs, which is the trueft liberty, the liberty of men, of intelligent and moral agents?

Secondly, Pursuant to this, chriftians by the gospel have obtained a deliverance from condemnation, and therefore it may juftly be called the law of liberty. Death is the punishment of fin, established unalterably by the law of God; mankind, therefore, conscious of guilt, have a dread of it which fills their minds with horror, and holds them in an uncomfortable bondage. According to the clearness of the apprehenfions which VOL. I. they

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SERM.they have concerning the divine law, and II. the threatnings contained in it, fo is their

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terror; and the Jewish law being the most express in this point, without declaring the remiffion of fin, it is, therefore, called the miniftration of death and of condemnation; and they who were under it, received the Spirit of bondage to fear, as the apostle says, Rom. viii. 15. But, Christ Jefus having tafted death for every man, and being, in order to reconcile us to God, as mediator, made partaker of flesh and blood, that by death be might deftroy him who had the power of death, that is the devil, he has by his law of grace proclaimed forgiveness, and an immunity from the punishment of fin to fuch as fincerely repent, thus exprefs'd, Heb. ii. 15. to deliver them who through fear of death were all their life time fubject to bondage. Upon which they who are fò delivered receive the spirit of adoption, whereby they ferve God and obey his commandments with freedom and chearfulness.

Thirdly, The gospel is a law of liberty, as it frees chriftians from the burthenfome rites of the Mofaic inftitution. When God was pleased to feparate the Ifraelites for a peculiar people unto himself, and form them

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into a nation and a church, he faw fit, for SERM. what reasons I do not now inquire, to appoint II. a multitude of ceremonies which were to continue in force during that difpenfation. This must be very grievous to a rational worshipper, whose great fatifaction it is to fee the reasonableness of the actions he performs, and their conduciveness to the true ends of worship. The apostles therefore speak meanly of those ordinances, comparing them with the liberty, the spirit and truth of chriftianity; they call them carnal, beggarly elements, the rudiments of this world, and only fhadows of good things to come. Befides, the terror which accompanied that -ministration because of the severity of its -threatnings, the weakness and unprofitable

nefs of the fervice itself made the very attendance on it a great grievance. But, now, sthe Lord is that fpirit of which christianity is the ministration; not like the killing letter of the Old Testament, which denounced wrath for every offence, but a ministry of righteousness or juftification, which exceeds in glory, especially, because thereby the excellent things of religious virtue, the dibovine precepts of eternal righteousness, are engraven on the fleshly tables of the heart, forming in it noble difpofitions, moft becoming

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