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DISCOURSE VII.

JOHN i. 12.

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.

ALL our conceptions of a future state, and of our present relation to it, are obviously very inadequate and imperfect. For we have no direct intercourse with the invisible world: we see it only by the eye of faith: we think of it only through the assistance of analogy: we speak of it only in language originally appropriated to the objects of time and sense.

Hence it is that the sacred Scriptures, in accommodation to our weak and limited understanding, abound so much in metaphor and allegory. The character of God himself, that awful and mysterious Being; all his majestic works in the kingdoms of Nature, Providence, and Grace; and all the various and important relations which he

sustains to his intelligent creatures, are there expressed in terms borrowed from the present state and circumstanees of our being. A judicious reference, therefore, to this state and to these circumstances often affords the best, and sometimes the only, solution of the figures of holy writ.

Believers are, in this manner, called "God's husbandry;" because the seeds of holiness originally implanted in their hearts by his hand, cherished by the dews of Divine Grace, and invigorated by the beams of the Sun of Righteousness, grow up, under this culture, into that mature perfection of beauty which they will eternally exhibit in the paradise above. Believers are called "God's building;" because, like a wise architect, he forms, and fashions, and disposes their spiritual graces into a divine symmetry and proportion, so as to render their hearts fit temples for the residence of his Holy Spirit. Believers are also called "a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people;" all of which metaphors derive their significancy from that course of God's providence in this world which falls within the scope of human observation and experience. What a variety, and, I had almost said, redundancy, of figure is here employed to denote the relation between Christians and their God. Strong, in

deed, is the tie which binds their temporal and eternal destiny to the Throne of Heaven, securing to them the perpetual guidance, protection, and friendship of Jehovah.

But our text exhibits this relation in language still more animating and affecting to the pious heart. "But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name;"-sons of God; of that "high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity;" to whom belong the " greatness and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty, for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is his ;"-sons of God; of that holy One "who is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look upon iniquity;"" in whose sight the heavens are not clean, and whose angels he chargeth with folly." Well may we exclaim with the Psalmist, "Lord, what is man that thou takest knowledge of him, or the son of man that thou makest account of him?" and with the beloved disciple, "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God!"

Let us cherish, my brethren, these salutary emotions of pious wonder and filial gratitude, while we consider what it is for man to become a son of God. In attempting to elucidate this subject,

I shall notice the past condition, the present character and privileges, and the future prospects of such as become sons of God.

I. In the first place, as to the past condition of the sons of God; they have been removed from the family of Satan, and are no longer children of the wicked one. "In this," saith the Scripture, the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God." "He that com

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mitteth sin is of the devil."

It is indeed a melancholy and ought to be to us all an alarming truth, that they who are enemies to God by wicked works; who feel not towards him the submissive, dependent, and obedient temper of children; who refuse to receive the unspeakable gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, are sons of the great adversary of souls, "the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience." What an odious parentage is this, so much to resemble, both in disposition and conduct, the chief of apostate spirits, the grand enemy of God and of all good, as to deserve the title of his children!

Think not, my hearers, that this language savours too much of severity and invective. Even he who was the Friend of sinners, and who laid

down his life for them, once said to certain of the

ye

Jews, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of father your will do." "If God were your Father, ye would love me." And if God were thy Father, fellow-sinner, thou wouldest love his Son-thou wouldest repose all thy confidence in him as thine only Saviour and thine only hope. So long as thou refusest to do this, thou art of thy father the devil, and the lusts of thy father thou wilt do. He, therefore, who becomes a son of God, must first cease to be a child of the wicked

one.

II. When we consider, in the second place, the present character and privileges of the sons of God, we remark, that they become such by being born "not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." Such is the emphatical language which Scripture employs to illustrate, by a striking metaphor, that mighty transformation of moral character effected, by the Spirit of God alone, in the heart of the sinner.

It is a birth-that is, the commencement of a new and spiritual life-constituting a most intimate and affecting relation between the subjects of it and its Author. By it, they become his sons in a peculiar and appropriate sense: for they are made partakers of his Divine nature. They are