And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I But those things, which God before had shewed by the -to them that have obtained like precious faith with us. 252. He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard their line (or rather, according to the LXX, their SERMON LXXI. THE DOCTRINE OF UNIVERSAL REDEMP- 1 TIM. iv. 10. The living God; who is the Saviour of all men, THERE are two points of doctrine here plainly as- SERM. serted by St. Paul, which I shall endeavour to explain and to apply: one, that God is the Saviour of all men; another, that he is peculiarly the Saviour of the faithful. a For the first, 6. LXXI. and the God in many respects may truly be conceived and called the Saviour of all men; for the word save doth in a large acception denote the conferring any kind of good; as implying a removal of need, or indigence. Whence God is the Saviour of all men, Psal. xxxvi. as the universal preserver and upholder of all things old transl. in their being and natural state, as it is in the Psalm: Thou, Lord, savest man and beast, or, as the gene- or is. ral benefactor, who is good to all, and whose mercies 9. are over all his works; who maketh his sun to rise Matt. v. 45 · upon the good and bad, rains upon the just and unjust, is kind and benign even to the ungrateful Luke vi. 35. and evil: or, as the common assistant, protector, and deliverer of all men, who in need or distress * Θεοῦ γὰρ πολλῶν ὄντων, ἐφ ̓ οἷς θαυμάζεται, οὐδὲν οὕτως, ὡς τὸ πάντας εὐεργετεῖν ἰδιώτατον. Naz. Orat. 26. LXX. σώσεις, σώζει;. Psal. cxlv. cxlv. 18. SERM. have recourse unto him for succour and relief, acLXXI. cording to what is said in the Psalms; The Lord is Psal. ix. 9. a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of cxlvi. 7,&c. trouble. The Lord is nigh unto all them that call Ixviii. 19, upon him. They cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he saved them out of their distresses. cvii. 13,&c. 20. In these kinds of senses, especially respecting natural and temporal good, it is manifest that God is the Saviour of all men. But that he is in this place termed such in a higher sense, with regard to mercies and blessings of a more excellent kind, and greater consequence, (to mercies and blessings of a spiritual nature, and relating to the eternal state of men,) may from several considerations appear. 1. For that according to apostolical use the words Saviour, Save, Salvation, are wont to bear an evangelical sense, relating to the benefits by our Lord Jesus Christ procured, purchased, and dispensed, concerning the future state of men. 2. For that questionless St. Paul doth here intend God to be Saviour of the faithful in this higher sense, and consequently he means him in the same sense (although not in the same degree and measure, or not altogether to the same effects and purposes) a Saviour of all men. 3. Because it is plain, that in other places of scripture, like and parallel to this, such a sense is de signed. As where, in this very Epistle, we are en1 Tim. ii. 4. joined to pray for all men, for this reason; For, saith St. Paul, this is good and acceptable before God our Saviour, who would have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge (or acknowledgment) of the truth; where σwrp uv, the Saviour of us, seems to denote the Saviour of us as men, (that |