words v. 47. 54. Verily verily I say unto you he that believeth on me hath everlasting life and I will raise him up at the last day The sum of all which Discourse is that he was the Messiah sent from God And that those who believed him to be so should be raised from the Dead at the last day to Eternal Life These who he spoke to were of those who the day before would by force have made him King And therefore 't is no wonder he should speak to them of himself and his Kingdom and Subjects in obscure and Mystical terms and such as should offend those who looked for nothing but the Grandeur of a Temporal Kingdom in this World and the Protection and Prosperity they had promised themselves under it The hopes of such a Kingdom now that they had found a man that did Miracles and therefore concluded to be the Deliverer they expected had the day before almost drawn them into an open Insurrection and involved our Saviour in it This he thought fit to put a stop to they still following him 't is like with the same design And therefore though he here speaks to them of his Kingdom it was in a way that so plainly bauk'd their Expectation and shock'd them that when they found themselves disappointed of those vain hopes and that he talked of their eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood that they might have Life the Jews said v. 52. How can this man give us his flesh to eat And many even of his Disciples said It was an hard saying who can bear it And so were scandalized in him and forsook him v. 60. 66. But what the true meaning of this Discourse of our Saviour was the Confession of St. Peter who understood it better and answered for the rest of the Apostles shews When Jesus asked him v. 67. Will ye also go away Then Simon Peter answered him Lord to whom shall we go Thou hast the words of eternal life i. e. Thou teachest us the way to attain Eternal Life And accordingly We believe and are sure that thou art the Messiah the Son of the living God This was the eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood whereby those who did so had Eternal Life Sometime after this he enquires of his Disciples Mark VIII 27. Who the People took him for They telling him for Iohn the Baptist or one of the old Prophets risen from the Dead He asked what they themselves thought And here again Peter answers in these words Mark VIII 29. Thou art the Messiah Luke IX 20. The Messiah of God And Mat. XVI 16. Thou art the Messiah the Son of the living God Which Expressions we may hence gather amount to the same thing Whereupon our Saviour tells Peter Mat. XVI 17 18. That this was such a truth As flesh and blood could not reveal to him but only his Father who was in Haven And that this was the Foundation on which he was to build his Church By all the parts of which passage it is more than probable that he had never yet told his Apostles in direct words that he was the Messiah but that they had gathered it from his Life and Miracles For which we may imagine to our selves this probable Reason Because that if he had familiarly and in direct terms talked to his Apostles in private that he was the Messiah the Prince of whose Kingdom he preached so much in publick every where Iudas whom he knew false and treacherous would have been readily made use of to testifie against him in a matter that would have been really Criminal to the Roman Governour This perhaps may help to clear to us that seemingly abrupt reply of our Saviour to his Apostles Iohn VI. 70. when they confessed him to be the Messiah I will for the better explaining of it set down the passage at large Peter having said We believe and are sure that thou art the Messiah the Son of the living God Iesus answered them Have not I chosen you twelve and one of you is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is a reply seeming at first sight nothing to the purpose when yet it is sure all our Saviour's Discourses were wise and pertinent It seems therefore to me to carry this sense to be understood afterwards by the eleven as that of destroying the Temple and raising it again in three days was when they should reflect on it after his being betray'd by Iudas You have confessed and believe the truth concerning me I am the Messiah your King But do not wonder at it that I have never openly declared it to you For amongst you twelve whom I have chosen to be with me there is one who is an Informer or false Accuser for so the Greek word signifies and may possibly here be so translated rather than Devil who if I had owned my self in plain words to have been the Messiah the King of Israel would have betrayed me and informed against me That he was yet cautious of owning himself to his Apostles positively to be the Messiah appears farther from the manner wherein he tells Peter v. 18. that he will build his Church upon that Confession of his that he was the Messiah I say unto thee Thou art Cephas or a Rock and upon this Rock I will build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Words too doubtful to be laid hold on against him as a Testimony that he professed himself to be the Messiah Especially if we joyn with them the following words v. 19. And I will give thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven And what thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and what thou shalt loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven Which being said Personally to Peter render the foregoing words of our Saviour wherein he declares the Fundamental Article of his Church to be the believing him to be the Messiah the more obscure and doubtful and less liable to be made use of against him But yet such as might afterwards be understood And for the same reason he yet here again forbids the Apostles to say that he was the Messiah v. 20. From this time say the Evangelists Jesus began to shew to his Disciples i. e. his Apostles who are often called Disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the Elders Chief Priests and Scribes and be killed and be raised again the third day These though all marks of the Messiah yet how little understood by the Apostles or suited to their expectation of the Messiah appears from Peter's rebuking him for it in the following words Mat. XVI 22. Peter had twice before owned him to be the Messiah and yet he cannot here bear that he should Suffer and be put to Death and be raised again Whereby we may perceive how little yet Jesus had explained to the Apostles what Personally concerned himself They had been a good while witnesses of his Life and Miracles
Luke VI. And I desire my Reader once for all here to take notice that I have all along observed the order of time in our Saviour's Proaching and have not as I think passed by any of his Discourses In this Sermon our Saviour only teaches them what were the Laws of his Kingdom and what they must do who were admitted into it of which I shall have occasion to speak more at large in another place being at present only enquiring what our Saviour proposed as matter of Faith to be believed After this Iohn the Baptist sends to him this Message Luke VII 19. Asking Art thou he that should come or do we expect another That is in short art thou the Messiah And if thou art why dost thou let me thy Fore runner languish in Prison Must I expect deliverance from any other To which Jesus returns this Answer v. 22 23. Tell John what you have seen and heard The Blind see the Lame walk the Lepers are cleansed the Deaf hear the Dead are raised to the Poor the Gospel is preached and blessed is he who is not offended in me What it is to be offended or scandalized in him we may see by comparing Mat. XIII 28. and Mark IV. 17. with Luke VIII 13. For what the two first call scandalized the last calls standing off from or forsaking i. e. not receiving him as the Messiah Vid. Mark VI. 1-6 or revolting from him Here Jesus refers Iohn as he did the Jews before to the Testimony of his Miracles to know who he was And this was generally his Preaching whereby he declared himself to be the Messiah Who was the only Prophet to come whom the Iews had any expectation of Nor did they look for any other Person to be sent to them with the Power of Miracles but only the Messiah His Miracles we see by his Answer to Iohn the Baptist he thought a sufficient declaration amongst them that he was the Messiah And therefore upon his curing the possessed of the Devil the Dumb and Blind Mat. XII the People who saw the Miracle said v. 23. Is not this the Son of David As much as to say Is not this the Messiah Whereat the Pharisees being offended said He cast out Devils by Beelzebub Jesus shewing the falshood and vanity of their Blasphemy justifies the Conclusion the People made from this Miracle saying v. 28. That his casting out Devils by the Spirit of God was an Evidence that the Kingdom of the Messiah was come One thing more there was in the Miracles done by his Disciples which shewed him to be the Messiah That they were done in his Name In the name of Iesus of Nazareth rise up and walk says St. Peter to the lame man whom he cured in the Temple Acts III. 6. And how far the Power of that Name reached they themselves seem to wonder Luke X. 17. And the seventy returned again with joy saying Lord even the Devils are subject to us in thy Name From this Message from Iohn the Baptist he takes occasion to tell the People that Iohn was the Fore-runner of the Messiah That from the time of Iohn the Baptist the Kingdom of the Messiah began To which time all the Prophets and the Law pointed Luke VII and Mat. XI Luke VIII 1. Afterwards he went through every City and Village preaching and shewing the good tidings of the Kingdom of God Here we see as every where what his Preaching was and consequently what was to be believed Soon after he Preaches from a Boat to the People on the shoar His Sermon at large we may read Mat. XIII Mark IV. and Luke VIII But this is very observeable That this second Sermon of his here is quite different from his former in the Mount For that was all so plain and intelligible that nothing could be more so Whereas this is all so involved in Parables that even the Apostles themselves did not understand it If we enquire into the reason of this we shall possibly have some Light from the different Subjects of these two Sermons There he preached to the People only Morality Clearing the Precepts of the Law from the false glosses which were received in those days And setting forth the Duties of a good Life in their full Obligation and Extent beyond what the Judiciary Laws of the Israelites did or the Civil Laws of any Country could prescribe or take notice of But here in this Sermon by the Sea-side he speaks of nothing but the Kingdom of the Messiah which he does all in Parables One Reason whereof St. Matthew gives us Chap. XIII 35. That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophet saying I will open my mouth in Parables I will utter things that have been keep secret from the Foundations of the World Another reason our Saviour himself gives of it v. 11 12. Because to you is given to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven but to them it is not given For whosoever hath to him shall be given and he shall have more abundantly But whosoever hath not i. e. improves not the Talents that he hath from him shall be taken away even that that he hath One thing it may not be amiss to observe That our Saviour here in the Explication of the first of these Parables to his Apostles calls the Preaching of the Kingdom of the Messiah simply the Word And Luke VIII 21. The Word of God From whence St. Luke in the Acts often mentions it under the name of the Word and the Word of God as we have elsewhere observed To which I shall here add that of Acts VIII 4. Therefore they that were scattered abroad went every where preaching the Word Which Word as we have found by examining what they preached all through their History was nothing but this That Iesus was the Messiah I mean This was all the Doctrine they proposed to be believed For what they taught as well as our Saviour contained a great deal more but that concerned Practice and not Belief And therefore our Saviour says in the place before quoted Luke VIII 21. They are my Mother and my Brethren who hear the Word of God and do it Obeying the Law of the Messiah their King being no less required than their believing that Jesus was the Messiah the King and Deliverer that was promised them Mat. IX 13. We have an Account again of this Preaching what it was and how And Iesus went about all the Cities and Villages teaching in their Synagogues and preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom and healing every Sickness and every Disease amongst the people He acquainted them that the Kingdom of the Messiah was come and left it to his Miracles to instruct and convince them that he was the Messiah Mat. X. When he sent his Apostles abroad their Commission to Preach we have v. 7 8. in these words As ye go preach saying the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand Heal the sick c. All that they had
believe him to be the Messiah And though they with others expected a Temporal Kingdom on Earth might yet rest satisfied in the truth of their Master who had honoured them with being near his Person that it would come without being too inquisitive after the time manner or seat of his Kingdom As men of Letters more studied in their Rabbins or men of Business more versed in the World would have been forward to have been Men great or wise in Knowledge or ways of the World would hardly have been kept from prying more narrowly into his Design and Conduct Or from questioning him about the ways and measures he would take for ascending the Throne and what means were to be used towards it and when they should in earnest set about it Abler men of higher Births or Thoughts would hardly have been hindred from whispering at least to their Friends and Relations that their Master was the Messiah And that though he concealed himself to a fit Opportunity and till things were ripe for it yet they should ere long see him break out of his Obscurity cast off the Cloud and declare himself as he was King of Israel But the ignorance and lowness of these good poor men made them of another temper They went along in an implicite trust on him punctually keeping to his Commands and not exceeding his Commission When he sent them to Preach the Gospel He bid them Preach The Kingdom of God to be at hand And that they did without being more particular than he had ordered or mixing their own Prudence with his Commands to promote the Kingdom of the Messiah They preached it without giving or so much as intimating that their Master was he Which men of another Condition and an higher Education would scarce have forborn to have done When he asked them who they thought him to be And Peter answered The Messiah the Son of God Mat. XVI 16. He plainly shews by the following words that he himself had not told them so And at the same time v. 20. forbids them to tell this their Opinion of him to any body How obedient they were to him in this we may not only conclude from the silence of the Evangelists concerning any such thing published by them any where before his Death but from the exact Obedience three of them paid to a like Command of his He takes Peter Iames and Iohn into a Mountain And there Moses and Elias coming to him he is transfigured before them Mat. XVII 9. He charges them saying See that ye tell no man what you have seen till the Son of Man shall be risen from the dead And St. Luke tells us what punctual Observers they were of his Orders in this case Chap. IX 36. They kept it close and told no man in those days any of those things which they had seen Whether twelve other men of quicker Parts and of a Station or Breeding which might have given them any Opinion of themselves or their own Abilities would have been so easily kept from medling beyond just what was prescribed them in a matter they had so much Interest in and have said nothing of what they might in Humane Prudence have thought would have contributed to their Master's Reputation and made way for his advancement to his Kingdom I leave to be considered And it may suggest matter of Meditation whether St. Paul was not for this reason by his Learning Parts and warmer Temper better fitted for an Apostle after than during our Saviour's Ministry And therefore though a chosen Vessel was not by the Divine Wisdom called till after Christ's Resurrection I offer this only as a Subject of magnifying the Admirable Contrivance of the Divine Wisdom in the whole Work of our Redemption as far as we are able to trace it by the foot-steps which God hath made visible to Humane Reason For though it be as easie to Omnipotent Power to do all things by an immediate over-ruling Will and so to make any Instruments work even contrary to their Nature in subserviency to his ends Yet his Wisdom is not usually at the expence of Miracles if I may so say but only in cases that require them for the evidencing of some Revelation or Mission to be from him He does constantly unless where the confirmation of some Truth requires it otherwise bring about his Purposes by means operating according to their Natures If it were not so the course and evidence of things would be confounded Miracles would lose their name and force and there could be no distinction between Natural and Supernatural There had been no room left to see and admire the Wisdom as well as Innocence of our Saviour if he had rashly every where exposed himself to the Fury of the Jews and had always been preserved by a miraculous suspension of their Malice or a miraculous rescuing him out of their Hands It was enough for him once to escape from the men of Nazareth who were going to throw him down a Precipice for him never to Preach to them again Our Saviour had multitudes that followed him for the Loaves Who barely seeing the Miracles that he did would have made him King If to the Miracles he did he had openly added in express words that he was the Messiah and the King they expected to deliver them he would have had more Followers and warmer in the Cause and readier to set him up at the Head of a Tumult These indeed God by a miraculous Influence might have hundred from any such Attempt But then Posterity could not have believed that the Nation of the Iews did at that time expect the Messiah their King and Deliverer Or that Iesus who declared himself to be that King and Deliverer shewed any Miracles amongst them to convince them of it Or did any thing worthy to make him be credited or received If he had gone about Preaching to the multitude which he drew after him that he was the Messiah the King of Israel and this had been evidenced to Pilate God could indeed by a Supernatural Influence upon his mind have made Pilate pronounce him Innocent And not Condemn Him as a Malefactor Who had openly for three Years together preached Sedition to the People and endeavoured to perswade them that he was the Messiah their King of the Blood-Royal of David come to deliver them But then I ask whether Posterity would not either have suspected the Story or that some Art had been used to gain that Testimony from Pilate Because he could not for nothing have been so favourable to Iesus as to be willing to release so Turbulent and Seditious a Man to declare him Innocent and cast the blame and guilt of his Death as unjust upon the Envy of the Jews But now the Malice of the Chief Priests Scribes and Pharisees the Headiness of the Mob animated with hopes and raised with miracles Iudas's Treachery and Pilate's care of his Government and the Peace of his Province all working
have I spoken to you in Proverbs i. e. In General Obscure Aenigmatical or Figurative terms All which as well as Allusive Apologues the Jews called Proverbs or Parables Hitherto my declaring of my self to you hath been obscure and with reserve And I have not spoken of my self to you in plain and direct words because ye could not bear it A Messiah and not a King you could not understand And a King living in Poverty and Persecution and dying the Death of a Slave and Malefactor upon a Cross you could not put together And had I told you in plain words that I was the Messiah and given you a direct Commission to Preach to others that I professedly owned my self to be the Messiah you and they would have been ready to have made a Commotion to have set me upon the Throne of my Father David and to fight for me that your Messiah your King in whom are your hopes of a Kingdom should not be delivered up into the hands of his Enemies to be put to Death And of this Peter will instantly give you an Example But the time cometh when I shall no more speak unto you in Parables but I shall shew unto you plainly of the Father My Death and Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Ghost will speedily enlighten you and then I shall make you know the Will and Design of the Father What a Kingdom I am to have and by what means and to what end v. 27. And this the Father himself will shew unto you For he loveth you because ye have loved me and have believed that I came out from the Father Because ye have believed that I am the Son of God the Messiah That he hath anointed and sent me Though it hath not been yet fully discovered to you what kind of Kingdom it shall be nor by what means brought about And then our Saviour without being asked explaining to them what he had said And making them understand better what before they stuck at and complained secretly among themselves that they understood not They thereupon declare v. 30. Now are we sure that thou knowest all things and needest not that any man should ask thee 'T is plain thou knowest mens Thoughts and Doubts before they ask By this we believe that thou comest forth from God Iesus answered Do ye now believe Notwithstanding that you now believe that I came from God and am the Messiah sent by him Behold the hour cometh yea is now come that ye shall be scattered And as it is Mat. XXVI 31. and shall all be scandalized in me What it is to be scandalized in him we may see by what followed hereupon if that which he says to St. Peter Mark XIV did not sufficiently explain it This I have been the more particular in That it may be seen that in this last Discourse to his Disciples where he opened himself more than he had hitherto done and where if any thing more was required to make them Believers than what they already believed we might have expected they should have heard of it there were no new Articles proposed to them but what they believed before viz. That he was the Messiah the Son of God sent from the Father Though of his manner of proceeding and his sudden leaving the World and some few particulars he made them understand something more than they did before But as to the main design of the Gospel viz. That he had a Kingdom that he should be put to Death and rise again and ascend into Heaven to his Father and come again in Glory to Judge the World This he had told them And so had acquainted them with the Great Council of God in sending him the Messiah and omitted nothing that was necessary to be known or believed in it And so he tells them himself Iohn XV. 15. Henceforth I call ye not Servants for the Servant knoweth not what his Lord does But I have called ye Friends for ALL THINGS I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you though perhaps ye do not so fully comprehend them as you will shortly when I am risen and ascended To conclude all in his Prayer which shuts up this Discourse he tells the Father what he had made known to his Apostles The Result whereof we have Iohn XVII 8. I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me and they have received them and THEY HAVE BELIEVED THAT THOV DIDST SEND ME Which is in effect that he was the Messiah promised and sent by God And then he Prays for them and adds v. 20 21. Neither pray I for these alone but for them also who shall believe on me through their word What that Word was through which others should believe in him we have seen in the Preaching of the Apostles all through the History of the Acts viz. This one great Point that Jesus was the Messiah The Apostles he says v. 25. know that thou hast sent me i. e. are assured that I am the Messiah And in v. 21. 23. he Prays That the World may believe which v. 23. is called knowing that thou hast sent me So that what Christ would have believed by his Disciples we may see by this his last Prayer for them when he was leaving the World as well as by what he Preached whilst he was in it And as a Testimony of this one of his last Actions even when he was upon the Cross was to confirm this Doctrine by giving Salvation to one of the Thieves that was crucified with him upon his Declaration that he believed him to be the Messiah For so much the words of his Request imported when he said Remember me Lord when thou comest into thy Kingdom Luke XXIII 42. To which Jesus replied v. 43. Verily I say unto thee to day shalt thou be with me in Paridise An Expression very remarkable For as Adam by sin left Paradise i. e. a state of Happy Immortality Here the believing Thief through his Faith in Iesus the Messiah is promised to be put in Paradise and so re-instated in an Happy Immortality Thus our Saviour ended his Life And what he did after his Resurrection St. Luke tells us Acts I. 3. That he shewed himself to the Apostles forty days speaking things concerning the Kingdom of God This was what our Saviour preached in the whole Course of his Ministry before his Passion And no other Mysteries of Faith does he now discover to them after his Resurrection All he says is concerning the Kingdom of God And what it was he said concerning that we shall see presently out of the other Evangelists having first only taken notice that when now they asked him v. 6. Lord wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel He said unto them v. 7. It is not for you to know the Times and the Seasons which the Father hath put in his own power But ye shall receive Power after that the Holy Ghost is come
to any man an Authority to make a Religion for me or to alter that which God hath revealed And if they please to call the believing that which our Saviour and his Apostles preached and proposed alone to be believed an Historical Faith they have their liberty But they must have a care how they deny it to be a Justifying or Saving Faith when our Saviour and his Apostles have declared it so to be and taught no other which men should receive and whereby they should be made Believers unto Eternal Life Unless they can so far make bold with our Saviour for the sake of their beloved Systems as to say that he forgot what he came into the World for And that he and his Apostles did not Instruct People right in the way and Mysteries of Salvation For that this is the sole Doctrine pressed and required to be believed in the whole tenour of our Saviour's and his Apostles Preaching we have shewed through the whole History of the Evangelists and the Acts. And I challenge them to shew that there was any other Doctrine upon their assent to which or disbelief of it men were pronounced Believers or Unbelievers And accordingly received into the Church of Christ as Members of his Body as far as meer believing could make them so or else kept out of it This was the only Gospel-Article of Faith which was preached to them And if nothing else was preached every where the Apostles Argument will hold against any other Articles of Faith to be be believed under the Gospel Rom. X. 14. How shall they believe that whereof they have not heard For to Preach any other Doctrines necessary to be believed we do not find that any body was sent Perhaps it will farther be urged That this is not a Saving Faith Because such a Faith as this the Devils may have and 't was plain they had For they believed and declared Iesus to be the Messiah And St. Iames Chap. II. 19. tells us The Devils believe and tremble And yet they shall not be saved To which I answer 1. That they could not be saved by any Faith to whom it was not proposed as a means of Salvation nor ever promised to be counted for Righteousness This was an Act of Grace shewn only to Mankind God dealt so favourably with the Posterity of Adam that if they would believe Iesus to be the Messiah the promised King and Saviour And perform what other Conditions were required of them by the Covenant of Grace God would Justifie them because of this Belief He would account this Faith to them for Righteousness and look on it as making up the defects of their Obedience Which being thus supplied by what was taken instead of it they were looked on as Just or Righteous and so inherited Eternal Life But this Favour shewn to Mankind was never offered to the fallen Angels They had no such Proposals made to them And therefore whatever of this kind was proposed to men it availed them not whatever they performed of it This Covenant of Grace was never offered to them 2. I Answer That though the Devils believed yet they could not be saved by the Covenant of Grace Because they performed not the other Condition required in it altogether as necessary to be performed as this of Believing and that is Repentance Repentance is as absolute a Condition of the Covenant of Grace as Faith and as necessary to be performed as that Iohn the Baptist who was to prepare the way for the Messiah Preached the Baptism of Repentance for the remission of sins Mark 1. 4. As Iohn began his Preaching with Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand Mat. III. 2. So did our Saviour begin his Mat. IV. 17. From that time began Iesus to Preach and to say Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand Or as St. Mark has it in that parallel place Mark I. 14 15. Now after that John was put in Prison Iesus came into Galilee Preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom of God and saying The time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand Repent ye and believe the Gospel This was not only the beginning of his Preaching but the sum of all that he did Preach viz. That men should Repent and believe the good Tidings which he brought them That the time was fulfilled for the coming of the Messiah And this was what his Apostles preached when he sent them out Mark VI. 12. And they going out preached that men should Repent Believing Jesus to be the Messiah and Repenting were so Necessary and Fundamental parts of the Covenant of Grace that one of them alone is often put for both For here St. Mark mentions nothing but their Preaching Repentance as St. Luke in the parallel place Chap. IX 6. mentions nothing but their Evangelizing or Preaching the Good News of the Kingdom of the Messiah And St. Paul often in his Epistles puts Faith for the whole Duty of a Christian. But yet the tenour of the Gospel is what Christ declares Luke XII 3. 5. Vnless ye repent ye shall all likewise perish And in the Parable of the Rich Man in Hell delivered by our Saviour Luke XVI Repentance alone is the means proposed of avoiding that place of Torment v. 30 31. And what the tenor of the Doctrine which should be preached to the World should be He tells his Apostles after his Resurrection Luke XXIV 27. viz. That Repentance and Remission of Sins should be preached in his Name who was the Messiah And accordingly believing Iesus to be the Messiah and Repenting was what the Apostles preached So Peter began Acts II. 38. Repent and be baptized These two things were required for the Remission of Sins viz. Entring themselves in the Kingdom of God And owning and professing themselves the Subjects of Iesus whom they believed to be the Messiah and received for their Lord and King For that was to be baptized in his Name Baptism being an initiating Ceremony known to the Iews whereby those who leaving Heathenism and professing a submission to the Law of Moses were received into the Common-wealth of Israel And so it was made use of by our Saviour to be that Solemn visible Act whereby those who believed him to be the Messiah received him as their King and professed Obedience to him were admitted as Subjects into his Kingdom Which in the Gospels is called the Kingdom of God And in the Acts and Epistles often by another name viz. The Church The same St. Peter Preaches again to the Iews Acts III. 19. Repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted out What this Repentance was which the New Covenant required as one of the Conditions to be performed by all those who should receive the Benefits of that Covenant is plain in the Scripture to be not only a sorrow for sins past but what is a Natural consequence of such sorrow if it be real a turning from them into a new and
in that is to view them in their due light and the way to get the true sense of them They were writ to those who were in the Faith and true Christians already And so could not be designed to teach them the Fundamental Articles and Points necessary to Salvation The Epistle to the Romans was writ to all that were at Rome beloved of God called to be Saints whose Faith was spoken of through the World Chap. 1. 7 8. To whom St. Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians was he shews Chap I. 2. 4. c. Vnto the Church of God which is at Corinth to them that are sanctified in Christ Iesus called to be Saints with all them that in every place call upon the Name of Iesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of God which is given you by Iesus Christ That in every thing ye are enriched by him in all utterance and in all knowledge Even as the Testimony of Christ was confirmed in you So that ye come behind in no gift waiting for the coming of the Lord Iesus Christ. And so likewise the second was To the Church of God at Corinth with all the Saints in Achaia Chap. I. 1. His next is to the Churches of Galatia That to the Ephesians was To the Saints that were at Ephesus and to the faithful in Christ Iesus So likewise To the Saints and faithful Brethren in Christ at Colosse who had Faith in Christ Iesus and love to the Saints To the Church of the Thessalonians To Timothy his Son in the Faith To Titus his own Son after the common Faith To Philemon his dearly beloved and fellow-labourer And the Author to the Hebrews calls those he writes to Holy Brethren partakers of the Heavenly Calling Chap. III. 1. From whence it is evident that all those whom St. Paul writ to were Brethren Saints Faithful in the Church and so Christians already And therefore wanted not the Fundamental Articles of the Christian Religion without a belief of which they could not be saved Nor can it be supposed that the sending of such Fundamentals was the reason of the Apostle's Writing to any of them To such also St. Peter writes as is plain from the first Chapter of each of his Epistles Nor is it hard to observe the like in St. Iames and St. Iohn's Epistles And St. Iude directs his thus To them that are sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Iesus Christ and called The Epistles therefore being all written to those who were already Believers and Christians the occasion and end of writing them could not be to Instruct them in that which was necessary to make them Christians This 't is plain they knew and believed already or else they could not have been Christians and Believers And they were writ upon Particular Occasions and without those Occasions had not been writ and so cannot be thought necessary to Salvation Though they resolving doubts and reforming mistakes are of great Advantage to our Knowledge and Practice I do not deny but the great Doctrines of the Christian Faith are dropt here and there and scattered up and down in most of them But 't is not in the Epistles we are to learn what are the Fundamental Articles of Faith where they are promiscuously and without distinction mixed with other Truths in Discourses that were though for Edification indeed yet only occasional We shall find and discern those great and necessary Points best in the Preaching of our Saviour and the Aples to those who were yet strangers and ignorant of the Faith to bring them in and convert them to it And what that was we have seen already out of the History of the Evangelists and the Acts where they are plainly laid down so that no body can mistake them The Epistles to particular Churches besides the main Argument of each of them which was some present Concernment of that particular Church to which they severally were address'd do in many places explan the Fundamentals of the Christian Religion and that wisely by proper Accommodations to the Apprehensions of those they were writ to the better to make them imbibe the Christian Doctrine and the more easily to comprehend the Method Reasons and Grounds of the great work of Salvation Thus we see in the Epistle to the Romans Adoption a Custom well known amongst those of Rome is much made use of to explain to them the Grace and Favour of God in giving them Eternal Life to help them to conceive how they became the Children of God and to assure them of a share in the Kingdom of Heaven as Heirs to an Inheritance Whereas the setting out and confirming the Christian Faith to the Hebrews in the Epistle to them is by Allusions and Arguments from the Ceremonies Sacrifices and Oeconomy of the Jews and Reference to the Records of the Old Testament And as for the General Epistles they we may see regard the state and exigencies and some peculiarities of those times These Holy Writers inspired from above writ nothing but Truth and in most places very weighty Truths to us now for the expounding clearing and confirming of the Christian Doctrine and establishing those in it who had embraced it But yet every Sentence of theirs must not be taken up and looked on as a Fundamental Article necessary to Salvation without an explicit belief whereof no body could be a Member of Christ's Church here nor be admitted into his Eternal Kingdom hereafter If all or most of the Truths declared in the Epistles were to be received and believed as Fundamental Articles what then became of those Christians who were fallen asleep as St. Paul witnesses in his First to the Corinthians many were before these things in the Epistles were revealed to them Most of the Epistles not being written till above Twenty Years after our Saviour's Ascension and some after Thirty But farther therefore to those who will be ready to say May those Truths delivered in the Epistles which are not contained in the Preaching of our Saviour and his Apostles and are therefore by this Account not necessary to Salvation be believed or disbelieved without any danger May a Christian safely question or doubt of them To this I Answer That the Law of Faith being a Covenant of Free Grace God alone can appoint what shall be necessarily believed by every one whom he will Justifie What is the Faith which he will accept and account for Righteousness depends wholly on his good Pleasure For 't is of Grace and not of Right that this Faith is accepted And therefore he alone can set the Measures of it And what he has so appointed and declared is alone necessary No body can add to these Fundamental Articles of Faith nor make any other necessary but what God himself hath made and declared to be so And what these are which God requires of those who will enter into and receive the Benefits of