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with a trembling heart; and with arrows of conviction fticking in his foul; but at length he prevails against these things, and turns as fecure as ever. Thirdly, Summer and winter are alike to the branches of the dead flock. When others about them are budding, bloffoming, and bringing forth fruit; there is no change on them; the dead ftock has no growing time at all. Perhaps it may be difficult to know, in the winter, what trees are dead, and what are alive; but the fpring plainly discovers it. There are fome feafons, wherein there is little life to be perceived, even among faints; yet times of reviving come at length. But even when the vine flourisheth, and the pomegranates bud forth (when faving grace is difcovering itfelf, by its lively actings, wherefoever it is) the branches on the old stock are ftill withered: when the dry bones are coming together, bone to bone, amongst faints; the finners bones are ftill lying about the grave's mouth. They are trees that cumber the ground, are near to be cut down: and will be cut down for the fire, if God in mercy prevent it not by cutting them off from that flock, and ingrafting them into another.

Lastly, Our natural stock is a killing stock. If the stock die, how can the branches live? If the fap be gone from the root and heart, the branches must needs wither. In Adam all die, 1 Cor. XV. 22. The root died in Paradife; and all the branches in it, and with it. The root is impoifoned, thence the branches come to be infected: death is in the pot; and all that tafte of the pulfe, or pottage are killed.

Know then, that every natural man is a branch of a killing stock. Our natural root not only gives us not life, but it has a killing power reaching all the branches thereof. There are four things, which the first Adam conveys to all his branches; and they are abiding in, and lying on, fuch of them as are not ingrafted to Chrift. Fift, A corrupt nature. He finned, and his nature was thereby corrupted or depraved; and this corruption is conveyed to all his polierity. He was infected, and the contagion fpread itself over all his leed. Secondly, Guilt, that is an obligation to punishment, Rom v 21. By one man fin entered into the world, and death by fin: and fo death puffed upon all men, for that all have finned. The threatnings of the law, as cords of death, are twisted about the branches of the old stock; to draw them over the hedge into the fire. And till they be cut off from this flock by the pruning knife; the word of vengeance hangs over their heads, to cut them down. Thirdly, This killing ftock tranfmits the curfe into the branches. The ftock, as the flock, (for I fpeak not of Adam in his personal and private capacity) being curfed; fo are the branches, Gal. iii. 10. For as many as are of the works of the law, are under the curfe. This curfe affects the whole man, and all that belongs to him, every thing he poffeffes; and worketh three ways. (1) As poifon, infecting: thus their bleffings are curfed, Mal ii. 2. Whatever the mau enjoys, it can do him no good, but evil; being thus impoisoned

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by the curfe. His profperity in the world deftroys him, Prov.i. 32. The miniftry of the gospel is a favour of death unto death, to him, 2 Cor.. 16. His feeming attainments in religion are curfed to him: his knowledge ferves but to puff him up, and his duties to keep him back from Chrift. (2.) It worketh as a moth, consuming and wafting by little and little, Hof. v. 12. Therefore will I be unto Ephraim as a moth. There is a worm at the root, confuming them by degrees. Thus the curfe purfued Saul, till it wormed him out of all his enjoyments, and out of the very fhew he had of religion. Sometimes they decay like the fat of lambs, and melt away as tha fnow in a fun-fhine (2.) It acteth as a lion rampant, Hof. v. 14 I will be unto Ephraim as a lion. The Lord rains on them fnares, fre and brimftone, and an horrible tempeft, in fuch a manner, that they are hurried away with the ftream. He teareth their enjoy. ments from them in his wrath, purfaeth them with terrors, rents their fouls from their bodies, and throws the deadned branch into the fire. Thus the curfe devours like fire, which none can quench. Laftly, This killing ftock tranfmits death to the branches upon it. Adam took the poisonous cup, and drunk it off: this occafioned death to himself and us. We came into the world fpiritually dead, thereby obnoxious to eternal death, and abfolutely liable to temporal death. This root is to us, like the Scythian river, which, they fay, brings forth little bladders every day, out of which come certain imall flies, which are bred in the morning, winged at noon, and dead at night: a very lively emblem of our mortal ftate..

Now, Sirs, is it not abfolutely neceffary to be broken off from this our natural ftock? What will our fair leaves of a profeffion, or our fruits of duties avail, if we be still branches of the degenerate, dead and killing stock? But, alas! among the many questions toffed among us, few are taken up about thefe, "Whether am I broken "off from the old ftock, or not? Whether am I ingrafted in "Chrift, or not?" Ah! wherefore all this wafte! Why is there fo much noife about religion amongst many, who can give no goodaccount of their having laid a good foundation, being mere ftrangers to experimental religion? I fear, if God do not, in mercy, timeoufly undermine the religion of many of us, and let us fee we have none at all; our root will be found rottennefs, and our bloffom go up as duft, in a dying hour. Therefore, let us look to our ftate, that we be not found fools in our latter end.

II. Let us now view the fupernatural stock in which the branches, cut off from the natural stock, are ingrafted. Jefus Chrift is fometimes called the branch, Zech ii 8. So he is, in refpect of his human nature; being a branch, and the top-branch of the houfe of David. Sometimes he is called a root, Ifa. xi. 10. we have both together, Rev.xxii. 16. I am the root, and the off-fpring of David: David's root, as. God; and his off-fpring, as man. The text tells, that he is the Vine: i. e. he, as Mediator, is the vine-ftock, whereof believers

are

are the branches. As the fap comes from the earth into the root and flock, and from thence is diffufed into the branches; fo by Chrift, as Mediator, divine life is conveyed from the fountain unto thefe who are united to him by faith, John vi 57 As the living Father hath fent me, and I live by the Father: fo he that eateth me, even he fhall live by me. Now Chrift is Mediator, not as God only," as fome have afferted: nor yet as man only, as the Papifts generally hold but he is Mediator as God-man, Acts xx. 28 -The church of God, which he hath purchased with his blood. Heb ix 14. Christ, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God. The divine and human natures have their diftinct actings, yet a joint operation in this, difcharging the office of a Mediator. This is illuftrated by the fimilitude of a fiery fword, which at once cuts and burns: cutting it burneth, and burning it cutteth; the fteel cuts, and the fire burns. Wherefore Chrift, God-man, is the stock, whereof believers are the branches: and they are united to whole Chrift. They are united to him in his human nature, as being members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones, Eph. v. 30. and they are united to him in his divine nature; for fo the Apostle fpeaks of this union, Col. i. 27. Christ, in you, the hope of glory. And by him they are united to the Father, and to the Holy Ghoft, 1 John iv. 15. Whosoever fball confess that Jefus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. Faith, the bond of this union, receives whole Chrift, God-man: and fo unites us to him as fuch.

Behold here, O believers, your high privilege. Ye were once branches of a degenerate stock, even as others: but ye are, by grace, become branches of the true Vine, John xv. 1.

Ye are cut out of

a dead and killing stock; and ingrafted in the laft Adam, who was made a quickning Spirit, 1 Cor. xv. 45. Your lofs by the first Adam is made up, with great advantage, by your union with the fecond. Adam, at his belt eftate, was but a fhrub, in comparison with Chrift the tree of life. He was but a fervant, Chrift is the Son, the Heir, and Lord of all things, the Lord from heaven. It cannot be denied, that grace was hown in the first covenant: but it is as far exceeded by the grace of the fecond covenant, as the twilight is, by the light of the mid-day.

III. What branches are taken out of the natural stock, and grafted into this Vine? Anf These are the elect, and none other. They, and they only, are grafted into Chrift; and confequently none but they are cut off from the killing stock. For them alone he interceeds, that they may be one in him, and his Father, John xvii. 9, 23. Faith, the bond of this union, is given to none elfe: it is the faith of God's elect, Tit. i. 1. The Lord paffed by many branches growing on the natural stock, and cuts off only here one, and there one, and grafts them into the true Vine, according as free love hath determined. Oft does he pitch upon the most unlikely branch, leaving the top-boughs; 'paffing by the mighty, and the

noble,

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noble, and calling the weak, base, and despised, 1 Cor. i. 26, 27. Yea, he often leaves the fair and fmooth, and takes the rugged and knotty, and fuch were fome of you, but ye are washed, &c. 1 Cor. vi 11. If ye enquire, why fo? We find no other reafon but because they were chofen in him, Eph. i. 4. Predeftinated to the adoption of children, by Jefus Chrift, ver. 5. Thus are they gathered together in Chrift: while the reft are left growing on their natural ftock, to be after-' wards bound up in bundles for the fire. Wherefore, to whomfo ever the gofpel may come in vain, it will have a blest effect on God's elect, Acts xiii. 48. As many as were ordained to eternal life, believed! Where the Lord has much people, the gospel will have much fuccefs, fooner or latter Such as are to be faved, will be added to the mystical body of Christ.

How the branches are taken out of the natural Stock, and ingrafted into the fupernatural Stock.

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IV. I am to fhew how the branches are cut off from the natural ftock, the first Adam, and grafted into the true Vine, the Lord Jefus Chrift. Thanks to the husbandman, not to the branch, that it is cut off from its natural ftock, and ingrafted into a new one. The finner, in his coming off from the first stock, is paffive; and neither can nor will come off from it of his own accord; but clings to it, till almighty power make him to fall off, John vi. 44. No man can come unto me, except the Father which hath sent me, draw bim. And chap. v. 40. Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life. The ingrafted branches are God's husbandry, I Cor. iii. 9 The planting of the Lord, Ifa. Ixi. 3. The ordinary means he makes ufe of in this work, is the miniftry of the word, 1 Cor. iii 9 We are labourers together with God. But the efficacy thereof is wholly from him, whatever the minifter's part or piety be, ver. 7. Neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that water eth: but God that giveth the increase. The Apostle preached to the Jews, yet the body of that people remained in infidelity, Rom. x. 16. Who hath believed our report? Yea, Christ himself, who spoke as never man spoke, faith concerning the fuccefs of his own miniftry, I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, Ifa xlix. The branches may be hacked by the preaching of the word: but the stroke will never go through, till it be carried home on them, by an omnipotent arm. However God's ordinary way is, by the foolishness of preaching to fave them that believe, 1 Cor. i. 21.

The cutting off of the branch from the natural stock, is performed by the prunning knife of the law, in the hand of the Spirit of God, Gal.ii. 19. For I, through the law, am dead to the law. It is by the bond of the covenant of works, as I faid before, that we are knit to our natural stock; and therefore, as a wife, unwilling to be put away, pleads and hangs by the marriage tie; fo do men by the

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are the branches. As the fap comes from the earth into the root and ftock, and from thence is diffufed into the-branches; fo by Chrift, as Mediator, divine life is conveyed from the fountain unto thefe who are united to him by faith, John vi 57 As the living Father hath fent me, and I live by the Father: fo he that eateth me, even he fhall live by me. Now Chrift is Mediator, not as God only, as fome have afferted: nor yet as man only, as the Papifts generally hold but he is Mediator as God-man, Acts xx. 28 -The church of God, which he hath purchafed with his blood. Heb ix 14. Chrift, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God. The divine and human natures have their diftinct actings, yet a joint operation in this, difcharging the office of a Mediator. This is illuftrated by the fimilitude of a fiery fword, which at once cuts and burns: cutting it burneth, and burning it cutteth; the fteel cuts, and the fire burns. Wherefore Chrift, God-man, is the stock, whereof believers are the branches; and they are united to whole Chrift. They are united to him in his human nature, as being members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones, Eph. v. 30. and they are united to him in his divine nature; for fo the Apeftle fpeaks of this union, Col. i, 27. Chrift, in you, the hope of glory. And by him they are united to the Father, and to the Holy Ghoft, 1 John iv. 15. Whosoever fball confess that Jefus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. Faith, the bond of this union, receives whole Chrift, God-man: and fo unites us to him as fuch.

Behold here, O believers, your high privilege. Ye were once branches of a degenerate stock, even as others: but ye are, by grace, become branches of the true Vine, John xv. 1.

Ye are cut out of

a dead and killing foek; and ingrafted in the last Adam, who was made a quickning Spirit, 1 Cor. xv. 45. Your lofs by the first Adam is made up, with great advantage, by your union with the fecond. Adam, at his best estate, was but a fhrub, in comparison with Christ the tree of life. He was but a fervant, Christ is the Son, the Heir, and Lord of all things, the Lord from heaven. It cannot be denied, that grace was hown in the first covenant; but it is as far exceeded by the grace of the fecond covenant, as the twilight is, by the light of the mid-day.

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III. What branches are taken out of the natural stock, and grafted into this Vine? Anf These are the elect, and none other. They, and they only, are grafted into Chrift; and confequently none but they are cut off from the killing stock. For them alone he interceeds, that they may be one in him, and his Father, John xvii. 9, 23. Faith, the bond of this union, is given to none elfe: it is the faith of God's elect, Tit. i. 1. The Lord paffed by many ches growing on the natural stock, and cuts off only here one, ce one, and grafts them into the true Vine, according as free h determined. Oft does he pitch upon the most unlikely leaving the top-boughs; 'paling by the mighty, and the noble,

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