DISCOURSE VI. THE KING OF GLORY. REVELATIONS I. 7. Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye fhall fee him, and they also that pierced him; and all the kindreds of the earth fhall wail because of him. Even fo, Amen. T is the peculiar fupputation of the DISC. IT Christian church, as a pious writer well VI. obferves, to be in the year, and to commence the annual courfe of her fervices, at this time of Advent, herein differing from all other accounts of time whatfo DISC. ever. The reason of which feems plainly VI. to be this, because in the numbering her days and measuring her feafons, she does not fo much regard the fun in the firmament, as the great Sun of Righteousness, her Lord and Saviour who is in heaven. She confiders herself as "redeemed from "the earth;" and therefore no longer confined to the calculations of the world, or obliged to direct herself by the courses of the material luminaries. It is her employment to make known to her children the time of falvation, called in Scripture," the year of the redeemed;" and this year was introduced by the everlasting day-fpring from on high vifiting her; whereby fhe became, what the Spirit ftyles her, in the Revelation," a city that has no need of "the fun, neither of the moon to shine in "it, for the Lord God and the Lamb are "the light and the glory thereof.” The leffons and fervices therefore for the four first Sundays in her liturgical year propofe to our meditations the twofold Advent of of our Lord Jefus Chrift, teaching us that DISC. it is he who was to come, and did come, to redeem the world; and that it is he alfo, who fhall come again, to be our judge. These two Advents involve in them and comprehend between them the whole counsel of God for the redemption of mankind, by the coming of Christ in the flesh, with the final iffue of that counfel in respect of each individual, to be manifested at his coming to judgment. The end proposed by the church, in setting these two appearances of Christ together before us, at this time, is, to begct in our minds proper difpofitions to celebrate the one, and expect the other; that fo, with joy and thankfulness, we may now 66 go to Bethlehem, and fee this thing "which is come to pass, which the Lord "hath made known unto us," even the Son of God come to vifit us in great humility; and thence, with faith unfeigned, and hope immovable, afcend in heart and mind to meet the fame Son of God in the VOL. I. L air, VI. DISC. air, coming in glorious majefty, to judge the quick and dead. VI. And certainly, if any thing can lead men to repentance, and turn the hearts of the difobedient to the wifdom of that Juft One, the wisdom which maketh wife unto falvation, through faith in Chrift Jefus, it must be the united confiderations of his mercy and his juftice: his infinite mercy during the day of grace, when all fins, that can be repented of, are forgiven unto men; his inexorable justice at the day of retribution, when he shall infallibly render unto every man according as his work fhall be. And perhaps there is no better method of ftirring up our wills to procure an intereft, or of discovering the intereft we already poffefs in the love of Christ, than by viewing in their proper colours the terrors of his judgment, as they will shew themselves to the astonished world at that awful hour of his fecond Advent; when the mask put upon false principles and evil actions shall drop off, and all things be estimated by the measures measures of Chriftianity, and the ftandard DISC. of the Gospel of Jefus. The words of the divine and well beloved John now read are, it is prefumed, not improper for this purpose, as they evidently fall in with the defign of our church at this season, and speak the fame language with her Advent fervices-" Behold, he "cometh with clouds, and every eye fhall "fee him, and they alfo that pierced him; " and all the kindreds of the earth fhall "wail because of him. Even fo, Amen." In these words we may obferve, I. Chrift's Advent to judgment, with II. The circumftance of the world's VI. shall produce: 66 Every eye shall "fee him, and they alfo that 66 pierced him; and all the kindreds "of the earth fhall wail because of " him." L 2 III. The |