SERMON XXVII.

The Excellence of the Scriptures.

ACTS vii. 38.

-Who received the lively Oracles to give unto us:

STEPHEN, in his defence before the

Jewish council, gives a compendious history of God's dealings toward the seed of Abraham, from the days of that patriarch to the time of Solomon. From this history he proves, that Jesus of Nazareth, who had been rejected and crucified by the Jews, was the prophet, who, as Moses foretold, was to be raised up in that nation to instruct them in the will of God.. He says, Moses in his day declared to the children of Israel, "A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; Him shall ye hear." "This" Moses "is he who was in the church in the wilderness, and with the angel who spake to him in mount Sinai, and to our fathers, who received the lively oracles to give unto us.”

Moses, by the ministration of angels, received from God his lively oracles for the benefit, not only of the then present generation, but of their succes

sors also to the end of time. They were committed to the fathers, that by them, and by their children after them in succeeding ages, they might be transmitted to distant posterity. In the same way these oracles, and the additional oracles of the gospel-revelation are brought down to our days, and by us they are still to be communicated to those, who shall live in future days.

My design, from these words, is to shew the excellence of the Scriptures. And the obligation of parents to convey them to their children.

I. I shall shew the excellence of the scriptures.

The revelations given to the Jews are called Lively Oracles, because they proceeded not, like heathen oracles, from the pretended responses of senseless idols, or of departed spirits, under the artful management of designing impostors, but from the voice of the living and true God, communicated in a publick manner by the ministry of angels.

They may also be called lively oracles, because they instruct men in the way to eternal life, and foretel and describe that glorious Saviour, whom God has since sent to give life to the world.

As the scriptures of the Old Testament, so those of the New, are called by this name, because they are the means by which God communicates to us the knowledge of his will, and of the way of salvation. The excellence ascribed to the former, may be more eminently ascribed to the latter, in which God has spoken to us by his Son sent down from heaven, and by the Apostles of his Son, who spake by the spirit, which dwelt in him.

The scriptures come to us as a revelation from God, and their important contents demonstrate their author to be Divine. "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction and instruction in righteousness,

and able to make the man of God perfect, thoroughly furnished unto every good work."

If we consider the sacred volume merely as a history, it is the most complete, instructive and entertaining history, which can be found, or ever was written. There is none which, within so small á compass, contains so various and useful matter.

It narrates the origin of the world; the beginning of nations; the institution of government; the invention of arts; the settlement of various portions of the globe; the foundation of the church; God's dealings toward it in all ages of its existence; the rise and fall of empires, and the effects which these changes have had on the state of religion; the means used by providence for spreading the knowledge of the truth, and their various success; the preparation made for the coming of the Saviour; his character, works, doctrines, death and résurrection; the min. istry of his Apostles, and the extensive spread of his doctrines under their ministry. And if to these accounts we add the prophecies of scripture, wè have, in this book, a view of the world from its crea tion to its final dissolution.

If we were to read merely for the improvement of knowledge and the entertainment of the mind, no book could come in competition with this. But when we consider it as containing instructions relative to our conduct in life, and happiness in eternity, it rises in importance beyond all conception. How grand, solemn, and interesting are its doctrines!

It directs our eyes to the earth, the heavens and the wonderful works around us, and bids us learn from thence, that there is one infinite, eternal, allperfect Being, who created, sustains and fills the universe. It teaches us that this Being by his allpowerful word brought our world into existence, and in his wisdom peopled it with all its various in

habitants, and in his bounty spread over it all the rich furniture which we behold that he exercises. a continual providence over the world, and all creatures in it, from men down to the sparrow-that he directs and governs all events, great and small, publick and private, designed and casual, and will conduct them to a glorious issue-that he created the first human pair in uprightness, and placed them in a delightful situation, but under a particular trial, in which their fidelity would intitle them to a happy immortality that listening to the temptation of an apostate spirit, they violated the law of their trial, fell from their rectitude, and subjected themselves. and their race to death-that sin thus entered into the world and has spread its malignant influence among the human race-that, though a Saviour was early promised, and new terms of happiness were proposed, yet men revolted more and more from God, till infidelity and vice had so generally overspread the earth, that God by an awful deluge swept off the whole race, except a single family, which was preserved to replenish the world anew that after this, God from time to time gave particular revelations to holy men, and that by their example and instructions the knowledge of religion was continued-that God chose the nation of the Jews to be his peculiar people, instituted his worship among them, and gave them laws for the di. rection of their conduct, and promises of a Saviour, who should bring in a perfect dispensation, and accomplish the redemption of fallen men by his own death-that, in the time which his wisdom had appointed, the Divine Redeemer, who was to come, appeared in human nature, made a full revelation of God's will, and confirmed it by miracles, offered himself a sacrifice for human guilt, and after his death arose and ascended to heaven to be a constant intercessor for them who come to God in his

name that through this Redeemer there is pardon for the chief of sinners in a way of repentance, grace to help the infirmities of humble souls, and eternal life for them who seek it by a patient continuance in well doing-that God has appointed a day, in which he will raise the dead, and judge the world in righteousness, and that this Mediator is ordained the Judge-that he will render to all according to their works, to the righteous eternal life, but to the ungodly everlasting destruction.

These are doctrines which we learn from God's lively oracles, and from them only-doctrines in which mankind are deeply concerned-doctrines which are adapted to restrain the progress of vice, and to promote the solid interests of virtue and happiness.

The oracles of God exhibit the most correct views of human nature.

They teach us, that as our bodies were by God's hand formed from the dust of the earth, so our souls were given by his immediate inspiration, and are distinct from, and superior to our bodies. They give us a humbling representation of man, as springing from dust and returning to dust again; but an exalted idea of him, as partaker of reason and intellect, and designed for glory and immortality. They shew us the happy condition, in which man was first made, the sad state into which he soon fell, and the wonderful way in which he may be recovered. They point out his various relations, the duties resulting from them, the end and design of his being, the happiness which in the divine goedness is prepared for him, and for which by divine grace he is now preparing. They inform us, that he is here in a state of probation, and that every thing which he does, will have some influence to render his future existence happy or miserable.