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THE WORST HAVE GREATEST NEED.

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whole," saith he, "have no need of the physician, but the sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance."

Above, you read that the scribes and pharisees said to his disciples, "How is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners?" Alas! they did not know the reason: but the Lord renders them one, and such a one as is both natural and cogent, saying, These have need; most need. Their great necessity requires that I should be most friendly, and show my grace first to them.

Not that the others were sinless, and so had no need of a Saviour; but the publicans, and their companions were the biggest sinners. They were, as to view at least, worse than the scribes; and therefore in reason should be helped first, because they had most need of a Saviour.

Men that are at the point to die have more need of the physician, than they that are but now and then troubled with a heart-fainting qualm. The publicans and sinners were, as it were, in the mouth of death; death was swallowing them down: and therefore the Lord Jesus receives them first, offers them mercy first. "The whole have no need of the physician, but the sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." The sick, as I said, is the biggest sinner, whether he sees his disease or not. He is stained from head to foot, from heart to life and conversation. This man, in every man's judgment, has the most need of mercy. There is nothing attends him from bed to board and from board to bed again, but the visible characters, and obvious symptoms of eternal damnation. therefore is the man that has need, most need; and therefore in reason should be helped in the first place. Thus it was with the people concerned in the text, they were the worst of sinners, Jerusalem sinners, sinners of the biggest size; and therefore such as had the greatest need; wherefore they must have mercy offered to them, before it be

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offered any where else in the world. "Begin at Jerusalem," offer mercy first to a Jerusalem sinner. This man has most need; he is farthest from God, nearest to hell, and so one that has most need. This man's sins are in number the most, in cry the loudest, in weight the heaviest, and consequently will sink him soonest: wherefore he has most need of mercy. This man is shut up in Satan's hand; fastest bound in the cords of his sins; one that justice is whetting his sword to cut off; and therefore has most need, not only of mercy, but that it should be extended to him in the first place.

But a little further to show you the true nature of this reason, namely, why Jesus Christ would have mercy offered, in the first place to the greatest sinners. Consider that Mercy ariseth from the bowels of compassion, from pity, and from a feeling of the condition of those in misery. "In his love, and in his pity, he saved them." And again, "The Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy."

Now, where pity and compassion are, there is yearning of the bowels; and where there is that, there is a readiness to help. And, I say again, the more deplorable and dreadful the condition is, the more directly do pity and compassion turn themselves to such, and offer help and deliverance. All this flows from our first scripture proof, 'I came to call them that have need; to call them first; while the rest look on and murmur.'

"How shall I give thee up Ephraim?" Ephraim was a revolter from God, one that had given himself up to devilism: a company of men, the ten tribes, that worshipped devils, while Judah kept with his God. "But how shall I give thee up, Ephraim? How shall I deliver thee, Israel? How shall I make thee as Admah? How shall I set thee as Zeboim? (And yet thou art worse than they nor has Sodom committed half thy sins). My heart is turned within me, and my repentings are kindled together."

INSTANCES OF GREAT GRACE.

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But where do you find that ever the Lord did thus tenderly feel for, and long after any self-righteous man? No, no; they are publicans and harlots, idolaters and Jerusalem sinners, for whom his bowels thus yearn and kindle within him: for, alas! poor worms, they have most need of mercy.

Had not the good Samaritan more compassion for that man that fell among thieves (though that fall was occasioned by his going from the place where they worshipped God, to Jericho, the cursed city) than we read he had for any other besides? His wine was for him, his oil was for him, his beast was for him; his penny, his care, and his swathing bands for him; for alas! poor wretch, he had most need. Luke x. 30-35.

Zaccheus the publican, the chief of the publicans, one that had made himself the richer by wronging others; see how the Lord at that time singled him out from all the rest of his brother publicans, and that in the face of many Pharisees, and proclaimed in the audience of them all, that that day salvation was come to his house. Luke xix. 1-9.

The woman also that had been bound down by Satan for eighteen years together, his compassions putting him upon it, he loosed; though those that stood by snarled at him for so doing. Luke xiii. 11–13.

And why the woman of Sarepta, and why Naaman the Syrian, rather than widows and lepers in Israel, but because their conditions were more deplorable; for that they were most forlorn, and farthest from help. Luke iv. 25, 27.

But I say, why all these, thus named? Why have we not a catalogue of some holy men that were so in their own eyes, and in the judgment of the world? Alas! if at any time any of them are mentioned, how seemingly coldly doth the record of scripture present them to us? Nicodemus, a mighty professor, and Simon the pharisce, with his fifty pence; and their great ignorance of the methods of grace we have now and then touched upon.

Mercy seems to be out of its proper channel, when it deals with self-righteous men; but then it runs with a full stream when it extends itself to the greatest sinners. As God's mercy is not regulated by man's goodness, nor obtained by man's worthiness; so it is not much set out by saving any such. But more of this anon.

And here let me ask my reader a question. Suppose that as thou art walking by some pond side, thou shouldst spy in it four or five children all in danger of drowning, and one in more danger than all the rest, judge which has most need to be helped out first? I know thou wilt say, he that is nearest drowning. Why, this is the case. The greater sinner, the nearer drowning; therefore the greater sinner the more need of mercy; yea, of help by mercy in the first place! And to this our text agrees, when it saith, "Beginning at Jerusalem." Let the Jerusalem sinner, says Christ, have the first offer, the first invitation, the first tender of my grace and mercy, for he is the greatest sinner, and so has most need thereof.

Secondly, Christ Jesus would have mercy offered in the first place to the greatest sinners, because when any of them, receive it, it redounds most to the fame of his name.

Christ Jesus, as you may perceive, has put himself under the term of a physician, a doctor for curing diseases: and you know that applause and fame, are things that physicians much desire. These things help them to patients, and these things also will help their patients to commit themselves to their skill for cure, with the more confidence and repose of spirit. And the best way for a doctor or physician to get himself a name, is, in the first place, to take in hand, and cure some such as all others have given up for lost and dead. Physicians get neither name nor fame by pricking wheals, or picking out thistles, or by laying plasters to the scratch. of a pin; every old woman can do this. But if they would have a name and a fame, if they will have it quickly, they

THE GLORY OF CHRIST.

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must, as I said, do some great and desperate cures. Let them fetch one to life that was dead; let them recover one to his wits that was mad; let them make one that was born blind to see; or let them give ripe wits to a fool; these are notable cures, and he that can do thus, and if he doth thus first, he shall have the name and fame he desires; he may lie a-bed till noon.

Why, thus Christ Jesus forgiveth sins for a glorious name, and so begets of himself a good report in the hearts of the children of men. And therefore in reason he must be willing, as also he did command, that his mercy should be offered first to the greatest sinners. 'I will forgive their sins, iniquities, and transgressions,' says he, and it shall be to me for a name of joy, and a praise and an honor, before all the nations of the earth.'

And hence it is, that at his first appearing he took upon him to do such mighty works: he got a fame thereby, he got a name thereby. Matt. iv. 23, 24.

When Christ had cast the legion of devils out of the man of whom you read (Mark v.); he bid him go home to his friends, and tell it. "Go home," saith he, "to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord has done for thee, and has had compassion on thee." Christ Jesus seeks a name, and desireth a fame in the world; and therefore, or the better to obtain that, he commands that mercy should first be proffered to the biggest sinners, because, by the saving of one of them he makes all men marvel. And it is said of the man last mentioned, whom Christ cured towards the beginning of his ministry, "And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis, how great things Jesus had done for him; and all men did marvel."

When John told Christ, that they saw one casting out devils in his name, and they forbade him, because he followed not with them, what is the answer of Christ? "Forbid him not for there is no man who can do a miracle in my

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