VI.

your

Lord, of the Temple of the Lord are thefe ; SER M. But throughly amend your ways and doings; throughly execute judgment between a man and his neighbour; oppress not the stranger, the fatherless and the widow..

1

;

3dly, THEY alfo cannot be faid to worship God in Spirit and in Truth, who place religion chiefly in matters of opinion, Speculation and difpute; in Doctrines hard to understand, and of no use in practice. Though I understand all mysteries, faith the Apostle, and all Knowledge; and have not charity: I am nothing, I Cor. xiii. 2. There follows in the next verse an expreffion still more remarkable though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. From This paffage it appears, that the word Charity, in the New Teftament, does not fignify (as we now use it) only Alms to the poor; but That univerfal Love and Good-will towards all men, which includes both It and all other Virtues; The conftant practice of which univerfal Charity, is

indeed

SER M. indeed Worshipping God in Spirit and in

Truth.

VI. w

4thly. Or tranfgreffing this Precept in the Text, They also are guilty, who are over-zealous and contentious about Small things, which withdraw the affections and the attention from greater. Their fuperftitious zeal about which things, is like the unprofitable excrefcencies of fruitful plants, eating out and deftroying the life of religion. In our Saviour's phrase, they tithe mint, anife and cummin, and neglect the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and truth.

Laftly, ALL fuch perfons are very far from worshipping God in Spirit and in Truth, who living in the practice of any known fin, ferve not God with the whole Heart and Spirit, cleanfing themselves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit, perfecting Holiness in the fear of the Lord.

SERMON

1

BARRASS

SERMON VII.

Of the IM M UTABILITY
of GOD.

MAL iii. 6.

For I am the Lord; I change not.

VII.

h

N difcourfing upon thefe words SER M. of the Prophet, I fhall first indeavour to show in what refpects God must be acknowledged to be unchangeable; or wherein this Attribute of Immutability confifts. And 2dly, I fhall confider, what Ufes may be made of This meditation, in the government of our Life and Practice.

I. IN

SERM. I. IN order to explain the Nature of VII. This divine Attribute of Immmutability, and fhow diftinctly wherein it confifts; it is to be observed, that both in Reafon and Scripture God is confidered as Unchangeable, upon different Accounts and in very different Refpects.

ift. In refpect of his Effence, God is abfolutely unchangeable, because his Being is neceffary, and his Effence Self-existent: For whatever neceffarily Is; as it cannot but Be, fo it cannot but continue to be invariably what it is. That which depends upon Nothing, can be affected by Nothing, can be acted upon by Nothing, can be changed by Nothing, can be influenced by no Power, can be impaired by no Time, can be varied by no Accident. The Scripture does not often enter into the philofophical part of This Speculation, but yet very emphatically expreffes it in the Name which is given to God both in the Old Teftament and in the New. In the Old Testament, God himself declared it to Mofes, Exod. iii. 14, Thus fhalt thou fay unto the children of Ifrael, I AM has fent me unto you. And in the New Tefta

ment,

VII.

ment, St John fets it forth in the begin- SE RM.
ning of his Prophecy, Rev. i. 4. Grace be
unto you and peace, from Him which is,
and which was, and which is to come. O
ther things alfo Are, and have been, and
Shall be: But because what they have
been, might have been otherwise; and
what they Are, might as poffibly not
have been at all; and what they shall be,
may be very different from what Now is
therefore of Their changeable and depen-
dent effence, which to day may be one
thing, and to morrow another thing, and
the next day poffibly nothing at all; of
fuch a dependent and changeable effence,
compared with the invariable Existence
of God, it scarce deferves to be affirmed
that it Is. And 'tis very remarkable, that
in the paffage now cited, He which is,
and which was, and which is to come, the
words in the Original are placed in a very
unusual conftruction, a conftruction no-
where else found in the whole New Tef-
tament, nor perhaps in any other Book
but very fuitable to fuch a fingular oc-
cafion; fo as to fignify, Not barely, He
which is, and was, and is to come, (for
VOL. I.
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That

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