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greater measures of gifts and parts, and of the sanctifying graces of the Holy Ghost; but, in Relative Grace, all stand upon the same level. Adoption, Justification, Reconciliation, Mystical Union, all the privileges which Christ hath purchased for believers, are all common; and no more belong to the strongest, than to the weakest and most feeble Christian. An infant may be as much a son and heir, as a grown man. Others may, possibly, have greater' measures of the Spirit of Adoption, whereby they cry Abba, Father; but none can have a greater measure of the Grace of Adoption, nor is God more a Father to one than he is to another, no more to the strongest than to the weakest Christian: and, though one may have a greater measure of the Spirit of Adoption, yet all believers have the like measure of the Grace of Adoption: others may have a greater familiarity and acquaintance with God, but none can be more reconciled to God than thou art, if a true believer: others may have a more comfortable sense of this adoption, yet none can be more adopted and more justified than thou art. We do not usually beg of God further measures and further degrees of these things; but, if we stand under these relations to God, and have but the evidence of it in our own consciences, then we rest fully satisfied; therefore what Philip said to Christ, Shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us, may every true Christian say, “Lòrd, shew me my Father, shew me that God is my Father, that I am adopted into the number of his children, and this sufficeth: I have no more to ask, no more to receive, in that particular."

(2) As the Christian's portion in Relative Grace is satisfactory; so, likewise, is his portion in the Sanctifying Graces of the Holy Spirit an All-sufficient and Satisfactory Portion. "How can that be?" may some say. "Are not Christians always unsatisfied in their present attainments; and think they have got nothing, if they fall short of absolute perfection? Either they are not sufficient, or else their desires are most unreasonable."

I answer, Though the truth of grace wrought in a Christian makes him always desirous of more than what he hath already; yet is that grace sufficient and satisfactory, in Three respects:

[1] The least degree of true grace is sufficient to make the heart upright and sincere; sufficient to break the reigning power of sin, and to cast Satan out of his throne: it is sufficient to sway the heart to God, as its chiefest good; and to make his interest in the soul victorious and prevalent over the interest of

the world and flesh. This sufficiency the weakest degree of true grace hath.

And, herein, is Christ's power and ability to save most eminently glorious. Grace is a creature, in its own nature, mortal and corruptible; and, should Christ but for a moment suspend his influence, every temptation, every corruption would easily destroy it: now for Christ to preserve this weak and helpless creature in the midst of so many strong and mighty corruptions that oppose it, argues as all-sufficient a power, as it doth to preserve alive a single spark of fire in the midst of the raging and foaming sea. Now Christ not only preserves this weak grace alive, but makes it victorious and triumphant over all the powers of hell: they are not able to stand before it: it batters down their strong-holds: it routs armies of lusts and temptations: it alters and changes every faculty of the soul, and reduces them all to obedience; as if it were Christ's design, not only by his power to save the soul, but to do it in such a way as should most of all shame the Devil, baffling and subduing him by such a weak and contemptible thing as grace. And therefore St. Paul, when he prays against that temptation which sorely buffetted him, 2 Cor. xii. 9, God answers him, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect through weakness: as boisterous and as raging as thy temptations are; yet it shall appear, that thy weak grace, through my strength, shall at length overcome them.

[2] The least degree of true sanctifying grace is sufficient to entitle the soul to heaven and glory.

Let weak and doubting Christians, therefore, know this for their comfort, that the promise of eternal life is not made to the degrees of their grace, but to the truth of it; not to grace as strong, but to grace as true. Now the truth of grace may be in the least and in the weakest degree. That grace, to which our salvation is principally ascribed, is our faith: now it is not said, he only, whose faith is so strong as to overcome all temptations and all doubts and to flourish up into assurance, he only shall be saved; but, whosoever believes shall be saved, though his faith be very weak and very wavering. And the reason of this is clear for faith doth not save us as it is a sanctifying, but as it is a justifying grace; for, if it saves us as it sanctifies, then must all perish, since the faith of the strongest believer is mixed with so many imperfections, that render him worthy of eternal death. Faith therefore saves, as it justifies; and justifies, as it

entitles us to Christ's perfect righteousness: which title we obtain by being united to him and made one with him, through this grace of faith. But a weak faith is a most sure and inviolable bond of union to Christ, as well as a strong faith: a weak faith can make a full conveyance of the righteousness and merits of Christ to the soul, as well as a strong faith: therefore, the weakest faith of the most trembling and timorous Christian doth as firmly entitle him to heaven and glory, as the most strong and undaunted faith of the most assured Christian. Thus, then, though the children of God complain sadly of the weakness of their grace: yet, in the very least and meanest degree of grace, there is a twofold sufficiency; a sufficiency to break the reigning power and dominion of the strongest lust, and a sufficiency to give a firm title to heaven and glory. And what would you have more? Hath not Christ approved himself an All-sufficient Saviour, in giving and dispensing such grace, that the weakest and lowest condition of believers hath such a great sufficiency as this is?

But this is not all: for

[3] The least degree of true grace is a sufficient ground of joy and comfort; for comfort and satisfaction, for joy and

assurance.

be

These overflowing joys, this glorious assurance, believers may abound with, even then when they most of all complain of the poverty and weakness of their grace. It is not the degree of our graces, that gives us comfort and satisfaction; but it is the knowledge and evidence of the truth of them in our own consciences. The sun may be in a black and dismal eclipse, when many glittering and twinkling stars are not the tallest cedars cast the longest shade: and so, many times, that Christian, that is the tallest and the most eminent in godliness, may under the blackest and saddest desertions. The measures of comforts are not stinted by the measures of grace; but the meanest grace is a ground of true and inward joy and satisfaction, when the Spirit's witness doth irradiate it to us, as well as the greatest degree of grace. Joy and satisfaction flow from grace: both as it is the possession of that which in itself is very desirable; and because, more especially, it is the earnest of a future glorious inheritance. And hence it is, that there may be, at once, in the same heart, a complaining for the want of grace, and yet joy unspeakable and full of glory for what we have. As grace in itself is the most desirable good, so a Christian sadly

complaineth that he hath no more, but is stinted and kept so short in his allowance: but then, as grace is the earnest of future glory, so it yieldeth joy in the very possession; as knowing that a penny is as good an earnest as a pound, and the weakest grace may as firmly assure a Christian of eternal glory as the strongest.

Thus I have shewn that there is an all-sufficiency and satis factoriness in the weakest and lowest degree of grace, if it be but sincere. For, it is sufficient to make the heart upright and sincere it is sufficient to break the reigning power of sin: it is sufficient to cast Satan out of his throne: it is sufficient to sway the heart to God: it is sufficient to entitle the soul to heaven and glory and, consequently, is always a sufficient ground of true joy and comfort.

3. If an imperfect state of grace be of an all-sufficing nature, what will it be, when grace shall mount up into Glory? If there be so much in the earnest, what will there be in the Inheritance itself?

And this declares the all-sufficiency of Christ indeed, since he is able to instate us in such great and rich possessions, that the eye hath not seen, nor the ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive what they are, as the Apostle speaks. St. Paul, who once suffered a translation, and himself gives us a relation of his voyage into the other world, tells us. no more than this, that he was caught up into paradise, and that he heard words unutterable, that it was not lawful or possible for him to utter: 2 Cor. xii. 4, to 11: the happiness of heaven is so great, that it cannot be fully known, till it be fully enjoyed: it is a remaining rest, an inaccessible light, fresh and overflowing pleasures, an incorruptible crown, an eternal kingdom, too much for me to utter or you to conceive. Nevertheless, if the sight and full fruition of God, if the society of angels and the spirits of just men made perfect, if everlasting songs of praises and hallelujahs, if eternal raptures and ecstasies can be accounted a supporting and an all-sufficing good, all these serve to extol the all-sufficiency of Christ our Saviour, who can bestow upon us this ravishing, satisfying joy and glory. God is now to us the spring-head and fountain of all our mercies and comforts; and we lie below at the fall of this spring, and draw refreshments from him only through the conduit pipes of providences and ordinances, and live upon second-hand enjoyments; but, in heaven, we shall be laid close to the fountain itself, and drink in

divine communications as they flow immediately from God, without having them deadened and flattened in the conveyance. Now, we behold him through a glass darkly: then, we shall see him face to face, see him as he is, and know him as we are known by him. And, if it causeth now such raptures of joy in us, when he sometimes darts in half a glance of his eye upon the soul, oh then within what bounds can our joy contain itself, when we shall constantly fix our eye upon God, and stedfastly behold his face; that face, from which the most glorious angels, as conscious of their own unworthiness to behold it, cover and veil their own! If now, when God gives us some glorious discoveries of himself, we are ready to faint and melt down under them, certainly, in heaven, when we shall lie under the glorious rays of the Deity beating fully upon us, they will be so great, that there were no living there did not the same God strengthen as well as fill our capacities. This is that Beatifical Vision, that heaven of heaven, that glory, wherein the angels are satisfied; that sight, wherein God shall bestow upon us a clearer eye than that of faith, and be always present with us in a nearer way than that of comfort. This is that all-sufficient and all-satisfying state, which the Lord Jesus Christ can and will bring all his unto: a state of inconceivable and endless felicity, far surmounting in glory whatever our narrow conceptions can now apprehend: a state, wherein we shall for ever join with angels in singing praises to the Lamb, who hath redeemed us with his own blood, and manifested himself to be an All-sufficient Saviour, able to save unto the uttermost all that come unto God by him; purchasing so great and glorious an inheritance for them, and bringing them to the possession of it.

That is the Second Demonstration.

iii. Christ's all-sufficiency to save doth appear in this, that HE

IS ABLE TO SAVE FROM THE GREATEST MISERY, AND TO SUPPLY THE GREATEST WANTS.

1. There is but one Estate of Misery, out of which Christ cannot save; and that is a state of damnation. And yet the damned spirits are not finally irrecoverable, for want of intrinsical value and satisfactoriness in Christ to deliver them; but because Christ never intended to purchase salvation for them: had his sacrifice been intended for them as it was for us, and the means applied to them as well as to us, those chains of everlasting darkness, which they are now reserved in, would have dropped

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