If we suffer orthodoxy to fail, or God's truth to be dishonored, future generations will despise and execrate our name. As surely as Jesus is a son, so surely are we, for the same Spirit bears witness to both, as it is written "And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." He starts! If not, tremble, for there are but two vast families in this world. Climbing the lofty Alps, or wandering through the charming valley, skimming the blue sea, or traversing the verdant forest, we have felt that this world, however desecrated by sin, was evidently built to be a temple of God, and the grandeur and the glory of it plainly declare that "the earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof." We cannot be condemned for "Christ hath died. The glorious Spirit, one with God, attests the truth of the testimony, and beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. We little know how many a blessing the poor man's prayer brings down upon us. God has given us full assurance, and infallible testimony, and in all this we rejoice. The next clause of the sentence reads thus: "WHO IS EVEN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD." It Jesus is thine all-prevailing king, and hath trodden thine enemies beneath his feet, if sin, death, and hell, are now only parts of his empire, for he is Lord of all, and if thou art represented in him, and he is thy guarantee, thy sworn surety, it cannot be by any possibility that thou canst be condemned. And now as a matter of EXAMINATION let each man judge himself by certain characteristics of heavenly calling which I am about to mention. ----- "The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God; and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together." Romans 8:16-17. "No," says he, "I can stop his mouth with this cry, 'It is Christ that died;' that will make him tremble, for he crushed the serpent's head in that victorious hour. Simply because the call of God comes to unworthy sinners. iniquity for which words fail in description! Did you notice how the text begins? If we are born into his family it is a miracle of mercy. If any man will contradict that flatly well, be it so. I will count it to be my highest glory if I may be made a knight of the cross, and may carry that cross upon my shoulder: to the world a badge of dishonor, but to me the ensign of glory, the escutcheon of honor. I feel that to the knee that dandled me and the breast that gave me sustenance, I owe more than I can ever pay; and to him who taught me, and led me in the paths of truth I owe so much, that I dare not speak of the tremendous weight of obligation due to him. What shall we say to that? Now, who is he that condemns the people that have such a head as this? Is it wisdom to stand in opposition against him? He to whom all these things are but as nothing, gives himself up to the inheritance of his people. And mark, every man that is saved, is always saved by an overcoming call which he cannot withstand; he may resist it for a time, but he cannot resist so as to overcome it, he must give way, he must yield when God speaks. So, you see, beloved, that because we have the "first-fruits of the Spirit," for that very reason, if for no other, we cannot help but groan for that blissful period which is called "the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body.". He knows and comprehends the cryings, and meanings, and sighings, and chatterings of his bewildered children. When he was seized by the officers of Queen Mary, to be taken to the stake to be burned, he was treated so roughly on the road that he broke his leg; and they jeeringly said, "All things work together for good, do they? You took a pleasure in it. If I could so read them the passage would certainly he very easy, and would very greatly alter my doctrinal views; but, as I do not find those words there, begging your pardon, I do not believe in them. If this be his ardent love of the Godhead, what must his hatred thereof be? Man, unless thou art a stranger here, and heaven is thy home, thou hast not been called with a heavenly calling, for those who have been so called, declare that they look for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God, and they themselves are strangers and pilgrims upon the earth. Go to the next house, and hear another groan. I would recommend that to many Christians. You can make your wooden cross into an iron one, if you choose, by being of a fretful disposition. They are lambs in the harmlessness of their dispositions, but they have the courage of lions when they defend the honours of their King. They are the family of God, and the family of Satan their character how different their end, how strangely divided! He can lay certain desires so pressingly upon our hearts that we can never rest till they are fulfilled. My spiritual distress robs me of the power to pour out my heart before my God. Jesus the Mediator must lose the glory which his finished work has procured for him, ere one of his co-heirs can miss of it; he must come down from that glory which he now inhabiteth, and cease to be honored as "the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed us unto God by his blood," if any one of his people shall be deprived of that glory, and be cast into hell. He can make the zeal for God's house to eat us up, and the passion for God's glory to be like a fire within our bones; and this is one part of that process by which in inspiring our prayers he helps our infirmity. Let your faith and your imagination work together to portray the unutterable glories of Immanuel, God with us, as he sits at the right hand of the Father. Men hate election just as thieves hate Chubb's patent locks; because they cannot get at the treasure themselves, they therefore hate the guard which protects it. Very likely all things will work together in a clean contrary way to that. God is angry with them, and they know it. Are ye brothers and sisters of the saints, and think ye that ye ought not to love and serve them, even to the washing of their feet? Is not the free air we breathe the purchase of their death? Talk we of his omnipotence? The poor client would plead, but still, when he won the suit, he would trace it all to the advocate who lived at home, and gave him counsel: indeed, it would be the advocate pleading for him, even while he pleaded himself. "Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands," poured out water, and began to wash his disciples' feet, and then went, with full knowledge of all that was before him, to pour out his blood to wash their souls from guilt. why needeth the Christian to have such firm, such massive foundations? no, the poor legalist is like a blind horse going round and round the mill, or like the prisoner going up the treadwheel, and finding himself no higher after all he has done; he has no solid confidence, no firm ground to rest upon. If he adds anything at all, it is still something about that same Christ "yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. Brethren, we have repentance, that gem of the first water. You may go down, down, down, till you seem to have got beyond the reach of help from mortal man; but there are cords and bands which bind you to Christ that even these depths can never break, come what may. The sighing of the prisoner surely cometh up into the ears of the Lord. Go to the greatest stranger, and he shall help thee; go to thy brother, and he shall oft upbraid thee. It becomes our business then to take the Spirit's witness through his Word, and through his works, but I would seek to have immediate, actual, undivided fellowship with the Holy Ghost, who by his divine Spirit, should work in my spirit and convince me that I am a child of God. In what way could the Father put greater honor on his Son than by forming a race like to himself, who shall be the many brethren among whom he is the well-beloved firstborn? It was most natural, therefore, that a deep spiritual experience should bring him to a clear perception of the doctrines of grace, for such an experience is a school in which alone those great truths are effectually learned. Now, beloved, it is in such a plight as this that the Holy Ghost aids us with his divine help. The next argument for making us sure that they will speed is this that they are "the mind of the Spirit." In English history, the days of Mary, when the saints at Smithfield bore witness for Christ at the stake, were grand days; and in Madagascar, did you ever read a more thrilling story than the record of the bravery of those Christian men and women who suffered the tyrant's cruelty? Suppose, my dear friends, that any of you were about to be tried for your life, do you think you could trust your advocacy with any man you know? Why, dying is the end of work; it is living that is hard work. Examine yourselves then whether you have been called. a. What contrasts we have in the seventh verse! Well said our poet just now, "It doth not yet appear, how great we must be made.". I might review all our powers, and write upon the brow of each one, "Traitor against heaven! After this consummation the believing heart is panting, groaning, and sighing. Still the bond was not cancelled until the day when Christ rose from the dead; then did his Father, as it were, rend the bond in halves, and blot it out, so that thenceforward it ceases to have elfect. Do you shrink from being tempted? An unconverted man may love a God, as, for instance, the God of nature, and the God of the imagination; but the God of revelation no man can love, unless grace has been poured into his heart, to turn him from that natural enmity of the heart towards God, in which all of us are born. Then it appears if we are called joint heirs with Christ, we legally and strictly have no inheritance apart from him. Oh, what an enterprise! I think I may say to those who are the beginners in the divine life, so long as your call is real, rest assured it is divine. Will you take the cross? For spiritual blessings which we know to be according to the divine will we could ask with confidence, but perhaps these would not meet our peculiar circumstances. The excellency of the power is in the doctrine, and not in my preaching. It is the challenge of a justified sinner protesting with holy and inspired fervour that his character is clear and his conscience clean, even in the sight of heaven. You shall find, when your biography is written, that the black page did but harmonize with the bright one that the dark and cloudy day was but a glorious foil to set forth the brighter noon-tide of your joy. Another thought concerning the universality of this statement. As sure as thou art God's called child today, thy poverty shall soon be at an end, and thou shalt be rich to all the intents of bliss. It is one of the ever-blessed exhibitions of the infinite love of God which without any cause in us, has set itself upon us. It is dreamed that this is an age when men do not need to be thundered at; when everybody is become so tender-hearted that there is no need for the sword to be held "in terrorum" over mortals; but that everything is to be conducted now in a new and refined manner; God the Universal Father, and all men universal sons. ", Then again, how zealous we should be for our Master! I am in this boat myself. If that is not the meaning of the text I do not understand the English language. traitor against God!" you are quarreling with this divine arrangement, you are beginning to differ with this blessed policy of God. He shows us where our deficiencies are, what our sins are, and what our necessities are; he sheds a light upon our condition, and makes us feel deeply our helplessness, sinfulness, and dire poverty; and then he casts the same light upon the promises of the Word, and lays home to the heart that very text which was intended to meet the occasion the precise promise which was framed with foresight of our present distress. If he cannot afford to pay, he ought to keep at home till he can." Christ's cross is entailed on all heirs of God. First comes Satan; then the world; then conscience; and last of all the law of God. He that will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution. what angelic tongue shall hymn his glory? We have this. He took the great mass of the sins of believers, and piled the whole on Christ; and when he hung upon the cross as his people's Substitute, even his Father hid his face from him. When we have broken his commandments, as we all of us have, we are debtors to his justice, and we owe to him a vast amount of punishment, which we are not able to pay. The old translators rendered the passage thus; "The mind of the flesh is enmity against God" that is to say, the natural mind, that soul which we inherit from our fathers, that which was born within us when our bodies were fashioned by God. Now, "The carnal mind is enmity against God." But let me say again to thee, hast thou ever felt that the Holy Ghost has borne witness with thy spirit in his word, and in his work, in thee; and in that secret whisper has he ever said to thee, "Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee." This poor man knows very little about law, and is quite unable to meet his cunning opponent. Romans 8:28 . Nay, ye say, we have some little gratitude towards earthly relatives. 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