Our faith is finished by the right use of his appointed means. We are edified and strengthened by religious ordinances; you are authorized to hope that God will bless you the rather for your walking as he directs, and doing what he commands. Consider religious rites as inestimable privileges, and endeavour to feel duly grateful for such sanctified tokens of his mercy and grace, which are so kindly adapted to your need. Observe them, not only in obedience to his authority, but also from a sense of your weakness, and from faith in his word. If Christ is the only physician who can restore us to spiritual health, his prescriptions certainly are to be observed. If he has a kingdom or church on earth, we should seek for it as a pearl of great price, and enter it as a city of refuge. If he has appointed men to be ministers of his word, and dispensers of his grace, true faith will teach you, for Christ's sake, to receive them. If any sacraments and other religious rites are ordained as channels of his power and pledges of his favour, them must you receive, not despising them as small things, or useless rites. Would you not "do some great thing," the greatest indeed possible for so good a friend, and so great a prize?

Finally, we are here taught to persevere. Naaman was to wash seven times. Had he done this once only, or twice, or even six times, and no more, there is no reason for supposing that he would have been cleansed. So he that endureth unto the end, shall be saved." We are commanded to run with patience the race that is set before us; it is our part to submit it to God's unerring wisdom and good pleasure, what shall be the number and the continuance of

our duties and of our trials. Let us labour in hope, and be not weary in well doing, knowing, that in due time, we shall reap if we faint not; and that the gifts and calling of God are without repentance."

That we may have wisdom and grace to make due improvement from the light and the means which are bountifully bestowed; that we may ever rightly distinguish, and duly estimate the waters of Israel; and whatever the Lord has ordained, devoutly perform, the same Lord mercifully grant, to our great comfort and peace; and to his glory and praise in Jesus Christ. Amen.

SERMON XIII.

THE DOCTRINE OF BAPTISM.

Rom. vi. 3, 4.

Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

St.

THE best things are sometimes the most abused. Even the doctrine of Christ, that grace of God, which bringeth salvation, and which teaches men, that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, they should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world, has been so perverted from its holy purpose, as to encourage men to live in sin." Paul, as he tells us in the third chapter of this epistle, was accused of Antinomianism; it was slanderously reported, and some affirmed that he said, "Let us do evil, that good may come; let us continue in sin, that grace may abound." He treats with abhorrence such perversion of the truth, and shows how totally inconsistent is the profession of Christianity

with a wicked life. He has taught the true doctrine of Christ on this subject with such force and perspicuity, and given such reasons why every one who names the name of Christ should depart from iniquity" and "walk in newness of life," that he who runs may read, and none but the wilfully blind can misunderstand.

This is true, that in all the chapters preceding this, from which the text is taken, and especially in the one which is immediately before, the apostle teaches, and by powerful argument and luminous illustration, establishes the more essential principles of the gospel, and the most distinguishing doctrines of Christ's religion; such as justification by faith, and salvation through grace. He shows that salvation is not of works, but is the gift of God. The boasted wisdom of the Greeks, and the descent of the Jews from Abraham, he proves will be equally unavailing, and totally insufficient to the attainment of life immortal; that Abraham was justified by faith, even in that noble and most astonishing act of obedience, the offering of his son Isaac. It is from this most comforting doctrine, our "being justified by faith, that we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." "The law entered that the offence might abound," and men be made sensible how corrupt the heart is.

"But where sin abounded,

grace did much more abound;" through faith in Christ, the most wicked transgressors of the law may obtain pardon, and peace, and life.

In this sixth chapter, St. Paul shows, that in teaching this doctrine of free grace, and of justification by faith, we do not make void the law, nor

lessen its influence upon the lives of men, but rather we establish the law. These doctrines of These doctrines of grace, by exposing the great sinfulness of breaking any the least of God's commandments, and by giving additional and most powerful motives to repentance and a holy life, do indeed establish the law, both in sentiment and practice. No people more strictly, or more conscientiously observe the law, than they who believe that it can never justify us; that by grace we are saved. He here refutes what is so slanderously reported of those who teach this evangelical doctrine; he shows that nothing can be more unjust, than to infer from what the apostles taught, that men may safely live in sin; that the more wicked men are, the more will God be honoured in their pardon and salvation. "What shall we say then?" What just inference may be drawn from the doctrine of free grace? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" May this pernicious inference be justly drawn? May we with any good reason argue thus? That since we are all sinners, and cannot be saved by our works; seeing that "God has commended his love to us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us," and that we are saved freely by grace, and not by our own works, why may we not reasonably and safely continue in sin, that God may be more honoured in the abounding of his grace? Why not live as we please, in all manner of wickedness, and wholly rely on the mercy of God? If we continue in sin, trusting in his free and sovereign grace, shall we not hereafter sing the louder to his praise? Is not this to practise the doctrine of grace? Is not this to live to the glory of God? To this the apostle