strangers in a strange land, often think how great your happiness and fafety is, in that God is your father; more careful, more indulgent and tender, than any of your fathers by the flesh, and infinitely better able to adminifter to all your wants; his eyes are always upon you, that be therewith may guide you in the way that he fhall chufe; his merciful ears are ever open to your prayers, he marks your fighs, notes down your groans, and treafures up your penitent tears in his bottle. What power therefore fhall prevail against you when omnipotence is your guard; or who fhall bring your souls into condemnation, which are bought with blood divine, and acquitted by the righteous fentence of the judge of all the earth? Think often on those comfortable words of our bleffed Lord, fear not, little flock, it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom; and if it be his gracious and unalterable purpose to give the greater, will he withold the lefs? No, in no wife thy bread and thy water, thy wool and thy flax, faith the prophet, shall be fure unto thee, and your God and Father will give grace, and glory too, and every good thing to them that walk uprightly.

Again, how highly are ye honoured, and how fe,curely kept, in that the heavenly warriors have the 7 care of you; for faith the pfalmift, the angels of the Lord pitch their tents round about thofe that fear him, to guard and guide you in your way to your Father's house in heaven; for, they are miniftring spirits to the heirs of falvation; although an hoft therefore fhould rife up against you, and although you have no wisdom or might to go out against them; let not your hearts be troubled, neither be ye afraid, for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth, and ye fhall

be

And

be fafe beneath the shadow of his wings. are ye then made new creatures in Chrift Jefus ? Marvellous mercy, undeferved grace! What manner of love is this the Father bath bestowed upon you, that ye fhould be called the Sons of God! How does it concern and behove ye to walk worthy of fo high a relation; never let the remembrance of the Lord's kind and gracious dealings with you, for one moment be forgotten by you. If a child born of noble parents is thought by wicked and profligate courses to dishonour his family and pedigree; how much more should you think it a brand of infamy and difgrace on that name by which ye are called, when by evil practices you deviate from the ways of holiness. Often call to mind your own dark state and condition, in which the Lord found you, and first in mercy looked upon you; what might you yet probably, nay certainly have been to this day, if fovereign grace, free and mighty had not delivered you; plucking you as brands from the burning; doubtless like others you had still been going on in the ways of fin and death, wretched, poor, miferable, blind, and naked, without the knowledge of your ftate, or concern to be delivered from it.

Often think of the undeserved love of that bleffed Jefus who did fo freely die, and lay down his precious life, emptying all his veins of that invaluable blood that circulated in them, a ranfom price for your never dying fouls; his tender heart was big with love and ftrange affection, to rebellious creatures, and when in you, O think upon it, when in you, O wonder at it! there was no form or comlinefs to recommend you, no vir

tue

tue or goodnefs to plead for you; but even when ye were enemies, did the dear Redeemer die to reconcile you to God, and bring you back to heaven. Once more, you are children, born of the fpirit, and quickened by grace, therefore the inheritance is certain; yet let me advise you to use with a religious fincerity all means for obtaining more light, more life, more joy, more love to God and all his ways, a greater degree of faith, and a more comfortable affurance of hope. Remember our bleffed Lord fays, I came into the world that ye might have life, and that ye might have it more abundantly; labour therefore to grow in grace and in the knowledge of God, and our Lord and Saviour Jefus Chrift; go on through the fpirit to mortify the deeds of the body, fo fhall ye live; add to your faith, weak as it may be fupposed to be, virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and every other grace; fo fhall ye fee more clearly what is the Lord's good pleasure concerning you, ye shall not stumble, at any dark dispensarion, but your calling and election fhall be made fure unto you.

I would next drop a word of advice to the young men in Chrift, may it be a word in feafon, and furthered with the bleffing of heaven.

I write to you young men, faith the apostle John, because ye bave overcome the wicked one, ye have tafted that the Lord is gracious, and are not ftrangers to the love of our dying Redeemer; yet are ye not out of the reach of temptation, nor fecure beyond the poffibility of falling; nay, you cannot entertain fuch a thought, but it is an argument that you are fallen already from that ftate of humility, and continual dependance which the

ye

christian ought always to walk in. Ye ftand by faith, be not high minded, but take heed left fall; the world, the flesh and the devil, are as far from being reconciled to you as chriftians, as when you first declared war against them, and turned your backs upon them; and whilft the enmity exifts, the defign to hurt will never die. Arm yourselves, therefore, that you may stand in the evil day, with the whole armour of God, yea with the mind that was in Chrift; be humble and watchful, and the God of all grace, will give you more grace, and make you as the beaten anvil to the blow. See that ye fet not up yourselves in your own esteem above others of your brethren, but think meanly of yourselves as ye ought; defpife not those that are weak in the faith, nor difcourage them by boafting of your fuperior attainments; which will be fo far from convincing your brethren of the abundance of your grace, that it may give them juft caufe to doubt the truth of it.

Again, let your hearts be much engaged with God, be diligent in the use of all means, that herein the babes may imitate you, and hereby may be encouraged in refpect to their own ftate; when they perceive you to draw your comforts from the only fource of blifs, and that you have no ftrength or power but as it is in God.

Moreover, as a youth that is an heir to a plentiful fortune, when about to enter on the poffeffion of it, would carefully examine the writings by which the inheritance is conveyed; fo be ye above all things particularly converfant with the word of God; read it by day, meditate thereon by night, and let it be precious in your esteem,

This bleffed word ind

above gold, and rubies. forms you of your title to the heavenly inheritance; fets forth before you the inconceiveable bliss that is referved for you; therefore this word is a finkilling, and foul-quickening word; for while your hearts are meditating on these bleffings, your affections will be apt to catch the fire, and your whole foul to be drawn out with defire to be diffolved and to be with Chrift in glory.

A word to the fathers, and I have done, fuch as the apostle Peter fpeaking of, fays, "Now "the God of all grace, who hath called us to his "eternal glory by Chrift Jefus, after that ye have "fuffered a while, make you perfect, stablish,...i ftrengthen, fettle you.'

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By the apoftle's prayer here we learn, first, l That all grace is from God, as the fource and q fountain thereof. Second, That God calls his people to eternal glory, when this fhort and troublefome life is over. Third, That this is to be obtained by Jefus Chrift. Fourth, That the way to glory is through fuffering. But, fifth, That this fhall iffue in their welfare that are thus called, for 1 hereby, God will perfect them. There is a defi-p ciency in the greatest faints, so long as they are in n the body, but God will not leave the work undone, Zerubbabel's hands have laid the foundation of the fuperftructure, and his hands fhall finish it. Stablish, in a pious path in which they fhall walk without wearinefs, or fainting. Strengthen, in faith, and hope, and every grace. Settle, in their everlasting habitation, from which there fhall be no remove. Is it fo that your hearts are as it were seasoned with grace? Let your fong be, The Lord bath done great things for us; let your

hearts