fures in heaven, but they are holy pleasures: there are places to stand by in heaven, but it is holy ground. That holiness that cafts up in every place, and in every thing there, would mar all to the unregenerate. (4.) Were they carried thither, they would not only change their place, which would be a great heart-break to them. but they would change their company too. Truly they would never like the company there, who care not for communion with God here; nor value the fellowship of his people, at least in the vitals of practical godlinefs. Many indeed mix themselves with the godly on earth to procure a name to themselves, and to cover the naughtiness of their hearts: but that trade could not be managed there. (5.) They would never like the employment of heaven, they care fo little for it now. The business of the faints there, would be an intolerable burden to them, seeing it is not agreeable to their nature. To be taken up in beholding, admiring, and praifing of him that fitteth upon the throne, and of the Lamb, would be work unfuitable, and therefore unfavoury to an unrenewed foul. Lastly, They would find this fault with it, that the whole is of everlafting continuance. This would be a killing ingredient in it, to them. How would fuch as now account the Sabbath-day a burden, brook the celebrating of an everlasting Sabbath in the heavens?

Laftly, Regeneration is abfolutely necessary to your being admitted into heaven, John iii. 3. No heaven without it. Tho' carnal men could digeft all these things, which make heaven fo unfuitable for them, yet God will never fuffer them to come thither. Therefore

:

born again ye must be else ye fhall never fee heaven, ye fhall perish eternally. For, (1.) There is a bill of exclufion against you in the court of heaven, and against all your fort: Except a man be born again, he cannot fee the kingdom of God, John iii. 3. Here is a bar before you, that men and angels cannot remove. And to hope for heaven, over the belly of this peremptory fentence, is to hope that God will recal his word, and facrifice his truth and faithfulness to your fafety; which is infinitely more than to hope the earth fhall be forfaken for you, and the rock removed out of his place. (2.) There is no holiness without regeneration. It is the new man, which is created in true holiness, Eph. iv. 24. And no heaven without holiness; for without holiness no man fhall fee the Lord, Heb. xii. 14. Will the gates of pearl be opened, to let in dogs and fwine? No; their place is without, Rev. xxii. 15. God will not admit fuch into the holy place of communion with him here; and will he admit them into the holieft of all hereafter? Will he take the children of the devil, and give them to fit with him in his throne? Or will he bring the unclean into the city, whose street is pure gold? Be not deceived, grace and glory are but two links of one chain, which God has joined, and no man fhall put afunder. None are tranfplanted into the paradife above, but out of the nursery of grace below. If ye be unholy while in this world, ye will be for ever miferable in the world to come. (3.) All the

unregenerate are without Chrift, and therefore having no hope while in that cafe, Eph. ii. 12. Will Chrift prepare manfions of glory for them, that refufe to receive him into their hearts? Nay; rather, will he not laugh at their calamity, who now jet at nought all his counfel? Prov. i. 25, 26. Laftly, There is an infallible connection betwixt a finally unregenerate ftate and damnation, rifing from the nature of the things themselves: and from the decree of heaven, which is fixed and unmoveable as mountains of brafs, John iii. 3. Rom. viii. 6. Ta be carnally minded is death. An unregenerate ftate is hell in the bud. It is eternal deftruction in embryo; growing daily, tho' thou doft not difcern it. Death is painted on many a fair face, in this life. Depraved nature makes men meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the damned, in utter darkness. (1.) The heart of ftone within thee, is a finking weight, as a ftone naturally goes downward; fo the hard ftony heart tends downward to the bottomlefs pit. Ye are hardned againit reproof: though ye are told your danger; yet you will not fee it, ye will not believe it. But remember, that the confcience its being now feared with a hot iron, is a fad prefage of everlasting burnings. (2.) Your unfruitfulnefs under the means of grace, fits you for the ax of God's judgments, Matth. iii. 10. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, is hewn down, and caft into the fire. The withered branch is fuel for the fire, John xv. 6. Tremble at this ye defpifers of the gospel: if ye be not thereby made meet for heaven, ye will be like the barren ground, bearing briers and thorns, nigh unto curfing, whofe end is to be burned, Heb. vi. 8. (3.) The hellish difpofition of mind, which discover themselves in profanity of life, fit the guilty for the regions of horror. A profane life will have a miferable end. They which do fuch things shall not inherit the kingdom of God, Gal. v. 19, 20, 21. Think on this, ye prayerlefs perfons, ye mockers of religion, ye curfers and fwearers, ye uuclean, and unjuft perfons, who have not fo much as moral honefty to keep you from lying, cheating and ftealing. What fort of a tree think ye it to be, upon which thefe fruits grow! Is it a tree of righteoufness, which the Lord hath planted? Or is it fuch an one as cumbers the ground, which God will pluck up for fuel to the fire of his wrath? (4.) Your being dead in fin makes you meet to be wrapt in flames of brimftone, as a winding feet; and to be buried in the bottomlefs pit, as in a grave. Great was the cry in Egypt, when the firft-born in each family was dead; but are there not many families, where all are dead together? Nay, many there are, who are twice dead, plucked up by the roots. Sometime, in their life, they have been rouzed by apprehenfions of death, and its confequences; but now they are so far on in their way to the land of darkness, that they hardly ever have the least glimmering of light from heaven. (5.) The darkness of your minds prefageth eternal darknefs. O the horrible ignorance fome are plagued with: while others who have got fome rays of morning light into their heads, are utterly void of fpiritual light in their hearts! If

ye

ye knew your cafe, ye would cry out, Oh! darkness! darkness! darknefs making way for the blackness of darkness for ever! The facecovering is upon you already, as condemned perfons; fo near are ye to everlasting darkness. It is only Jefus Chrift who can ftop the execution, pull the napkin off the face of the condemned malefactor, and put a pardon in his hand, Ifa. xxv. 7. And he will deftroy in this mountain, the face of the covering caft over all people, i. e. The facecovering caft over the condemned, as in Haman's cafe, Esther vii. 8. As the word went out of the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face. Laftly, The chains of darknefs ye are bound with in the prifon of your depraved state, Ifa. Ixi. 1. fits you to be caft into the burning fiery furnace. Ah miferable men! Sometimes their confciences ftir within them, and they begin to think of amending their ways. But alas! they are in chains, they cannot do it. They are chained by the heart,; their lufts cleave fo faft to them, that they cannot, nay, they will not, shake them off. Thus you fee what affinity there is betwixt an unregenerate ftate, and the ftate of the damned, the ftate of abfofolute and irretrievable mifery; be convinced then, that ye muft be born again; put a high value on the new birth, and eagerly desire it. The text tells you, that the word is the feed, whereof the new creature is formed: therefore take heed to it, and entertain it, for it is your life. Apply yourselves to the reading of the Scripture. Ye that cannot read, caufe others read it to you. Wait diligently on the preaching of the word, as by divine appointment, the fpecial mean of converfion: for it pleafed God by the foolishness of preaching to fave them that believe, 1 Cor. i. 21. Wherefore caft not yourselves out of Christ's way; reject not the means of grace, left ye be found to judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life. Attend carefully to the word preached. Hear every fermon, as if you were hearing for eternity: and take heed, the fowls of the air pick not up this feed from you as it is fown. Give thy felf wholly to it, 1 Timiv 15. Receive it not as the word of men, but (as it is in truth) the word of God, 1 Theff. ii. 13. And hear it with application, looking on it as a meffage fent from heaven, to you in particular tho' not to you only, Rev. iii. 22. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit faith unto the churches. Lay it up in your hearts, meditate upon it; and be not as the unclean beasts, that chew not the cud. But by earnest prayer beg the dew of heaven may fall on thy heart, that the feed may Spring up there.

More particularly, (1.) Receive the teftimony of the word of God, concerning the mifery of an unregenerate ftate, the finfulness thereof, and the abfolute neceffity of regeneration. (2.) Receive its teftimony concerning God, what a holy and juft one he is. (3) Examine thy ways by it; namely, the thoughts of thy heart, the expreffions of thy lips, and the tenor of thy life Look back through the feveral periods of thy life, and fee thy fins from the precepts of the word; and learn from its threatnings, what thou art liable to, on the account of

X 2

these

thefe fins. (4.) View the corruption of thy nature, by the help of the fame word of God; as a glafs which represents our ugly face in a lively manner. Were these things deeply rooted in the heart, they might be the feed of that fear and forrow, on account of thy foul's ftate, which are neceffary to prepare and ftir thee up to look after a Saviour. Fix your thoughts upon him offered to thee in the gospel, as fully fuited to thy cafe; having, by his obedience to the death, perfectly fatisfied the juilice of God, and brought in everlasting righteoufnefs. This may prove the feed of humiliation, defire, hope and faith; and put thee on to stretch out the withered hand unto him, at his own command.

Let these things fink deeply into your hearts, and improve them diligently. Remember, whatever ye be, ye MUST be born agam; elfe it had been better for you, ye had never been born Wherefore, if any of you fhall live and die in an unregenerate state, ye will be inexcufable, having been fairly warned of your hazard.

HE A D II.

The MYSTICAL UNION betwixt
CHRIST and Believers.

JOHN XV. 5. I am the Vine, ye are the Branches.

AVING fpoken of the change, made by regeneration on all thofe that fhall inherit eternal life, in oppofition to their natural real state, the state of degeneracy; I proceed to speak of the change made upon them, in their union with the Lord Jefus Chrift, in oppofition to their natural relative ftate, the state of mifery. The doctrine of the faints union with Chrift is very plainly and fully infifted on, from the beginning of the 12th verfe of this chapter; which is a part of our Lord's fare-well fermon to his difciples. Sorrow had now filled their hearts; they were apt to fay, "Alas! What will "become of us, when our Mafter is taken trom our head? Who will "then inftruct us? Who will folve our doubts? How will we be "fupported under our difficulties and difcouragements? How will "we be able to live without our wonted communications with him?” Wherefore our Lord Jefus Chrift feasonably teaches them the mystery of their union with him, comparing himself to the vine-stock, and

them to the branches.

He compares, I fay, (1.) Himfelf to a vine-ftock: I am the Vine: He had been celebrating, with his difciples, the Sacrament of his Supper, that fign and feal of his people's union with himself; and

had

had told them, he would drink no more of the fruit of the wine, till he fhould drink it new with them in his Father's kingdom and now he fhews himself to be the Vine, from whence the wine of their confo lation fhould come. The vine hath lefs beauty than many other trees: but is exceeding fruitful; fitly representing the low condition our Lord was then in, yet bringing many fons to glory. But that which is chiefly aimed at, in his comparing himself to a vine, is to reprefent himself as the fupporter and nourisher of his people, in whom they live, and bring forth fruit. (2.) He compares them to the branches, ye are the branches of that Vine. Ye are the branches knit to, and growing on this ftock: drawing all your life and fap from it. It is a beautiful comparison; as if he had faid, I am as a Vine, ye are as the branches of that Vine. Now there are two forts of branches: (1.) Natural branches, which at firft fpring out of the ftock: thefe are the branches that are in the tree, and were never out of it. (2) There are ingrafted branches, which are branches broken off from the tree that first gave their life; and put into another to grow upon it. Thus branches come to be on a tree, which originally were not on it. The branches mentioned in the text, are of the latter fort; branches broken off, (as the word in the original language denotes) namely, from the tree that firft gave them life. None of the children of men are natural branches of the fecond Adam, viz. Jefus Chrift the true Vine; they are all the natural branches of the first Adam, that degenerate vine; but the elect are all of them fooner or later broken off from the natural stock, and ingrafted into Chrift the true Vine.

DOCT. They who are in the ftate of grace, are ingrafted in, and united to, the Lord Jefus Chrift. They are taken out of their natural ftock, cut off from it; and are now ingrafted into Chrift as the new ftock. In handling of this, I fhall fpeak to the Mystical Union, (1.) More generally. (2.) More particularly.

A general View of the Myftical Union.

FIRST, In the general, for understanding the union betwixt the Lord Jefus Chrift, and his elect, who believe in him, and on him. 1. It is a spiritual union. Man and wife, by their marriage-union, become one flesh: Chrift and true believers, by this union, become one fpirit, 2 Cor. vi. 17. As one foul or fpirit actuates both the head, and the members, in the natural body; fo the one Spirit of God dwells in Chrift and the Chriftian; for, If any man have not the Spirit of Chrift, he is none of his, Rom. viii. 9. Corporal union is made by contract; so the stones in a building are united: but this is an union of another nature. Were it poffible we could eat the flesh, and drink the blood of Chrift, in a corporal and carnal manner; it would profit nothing, John vi. 63. It was not Mary's bearing him in her womb, but her believing on him, that made her a faint, Luke xi. 27, 28.

A