him; and he would feel as if he was almost setting up as a rival to God, if he did but know what he is hereafter to be. We have a number of representations of heaven in God's word,a rest, a kingdom, a crown, an inheritance, a city, everlasting light, living water, sitting down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, being before the throne. But all this is true in such a sense as when you cut out little paper figures to represent to children the splendours of a court, or show them little maps a foot wide to represent vast tracts of country. The reality of future glory will excel all that scripture says about it, as much as real countries and courts do maps and paper figures; because what God is to do is above all that we can ask or think. But, farther, the Apostle says,

2. That what exceeds human conception and the requests of God's people, is all inconsiderable in the eyes of God, and little in comparison with what he can and will do.-The Apostle stretches his powers to express himself largely enough: he is not content with saying, he will do what we ask or think, but above that; above all that; nay, abundantly above all that; nay, exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think, all that we could bring ourselves to pray for, above all we could conceive that we dare wish or pray for,

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is little or nothing in the eyes of God, not worth thinking of, compared with what he can and will do it is "exceeding abundantly above all." You think some of the appearances of providence for you, peculiar to this world, are great things; if you can hope your heart is renewed, and you have an interest in Christ, you think God has done great things for you. You think if you might be permitted to pray for all that blessedness you can conceive of, that would be a great thing: and it would appear so in your eyes; but in the eyes of God, and in connexion with the still higher purposes of his omnipotence, it is all as nothing, compared with what is yet behind. If you had lived in heaven a thousand years, the same thing might be said. Still he will be "able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think." Were you as great as the loftiest archangel in heaven, the greatest creature in the universe, there are still bottomless resources in the all-sufficiency of God; there are still such heights and depths and lengths and breadths, in his omnipotent purposes respecting his people, that still you might say, he is able to do more even now. In short, you never will know what God can still do. Go on as far as you may, there will always be bottomless abysses of eternity, and the boundless capacities of all-sufficiency to furnish still farther

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and higher happiness for his people. One age in eternity will never be able to discover to us what the next age will unfold and communicate. It will be always true, through the countless ages of eternity, that he is able to do for his people "exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think." "Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be." How the thought confounds and staggers one! It seems all extravagance and raphsody! And yet they are words of truth and soberness; for we are to measure all, not by our understandings, but by the omnipotent purposes of an infinite God; whose "thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor his ways as our ways.'

To close this discourse: If there be an omnipotent God, what is every thing that can be mentioned, compared with this one touching point-Is this God against me or for me?→ Supposing I was the idol of the universe, and all the crowned heads and great men in the world declared for me; supposing I had thousands of friends ready to lay down their lives for me; supposing all the angels in heaven, and all the creatures under the government of God, were to profess attachment to me; supposing this possible, and all thrown into one scale, and into the other scale this one sentence,

-The omnipotent God is employed against me;

what would all the other be?

a feather, and less than an atom.

Lighter than

And yet this

one point decides all. God is either for me or against me. What an awfully important turn! An omnipotent God against me! That sentence carries in it all the weight of damnation, and includes all the tortures of the damned. On the other hand, "If God be for us, who can be against us?"

Again: Learn the suitableness of the largest prayers.-When we ask for mere worldly blessings, or what passion or fancy dictates, we ask what we have no authority to hope that God will grant. But when we ask what is agreeable to the will of God, with a Christian temper, the largest, broadest, sublimest petitions that rise to the throne of God, express and request what, in God's eyes, is less than nothing compared with what he intends to give.What an encouragement to prayer!

Lastly: Learn the importance of waiting for God, in the way of duty.-We pray, and we hope, and we expect; but we are too apt to be impatient. Blessed are they that wait for him. O his gifts are worth waiting for!

THE OMNIPOTENT GOD THE JOY OF

THE CHURCH.

SERMON II.

[Preached at Kettering, April 29. 1792.]

EPHES. III. 20, 21.

NOW UNTO HIM THAT IS ABLE TO DO EXCEEDING ABUNDANTLY ABOVE ALL THAT WE ASK OR THINK, ACCORDING TO THE POWER THAT WORKETH IN US, UNTO HIM BE GLORY IN THE CHURCH, BY CHRIST JESUS, THROUGHOUT ALL AGES, WORLD WITHOUT END. AMEN.

WE have, this morning, been contemplating the amazing perfection of the omnipotence of God, and the various ways and unbounded extent in which it is exercised in behalf of humble and holy souls. We come now to take a different view of the subject: namely, To show that an omnipotent God is the joy of his church; or, that the omnipotence of God is matter of joy and praise to his church and people. The Apostle, in the text, in the name of the church, celebrates the praise of it. Here, then, we remark,

FIRST, That it is to the church and people of God that his omnipotence is matter of joy and