approaches to God, are difpleafing to him, and hurtful to our own fouls, for they hinder us from eating. Happy they who can believe and fear.— From this fubject, we may take the following DocTRINES, viz.

DOCT. I. That a fight of God in Christ, and a holy familiarity with him, with all fafety, is the privilege of God's covenant-people, especially in thefe folemn approaches to which he calls them. II. That it is a wonder of grace that finful creatures, in their folemn approaches to God, fee God, and are familiar with him, and yet come off safe.

We begin with

DOCT. I. That a fight of God in Christ, and a holy familiarity with him, with all fafety, is the privilege of God's covenant-people, efpecially in these folemn approaches to which he calls them.

IN handling this doctrine, we shall,

I. Shew what is that fight of God in Chrift, which is the privilege of his people in their folemn approaches to him.

II. What is that holy familiarity which is their privilege in their folemn approaches to him. And then,

III. Improve the subject.

WE are then,

I. To fhew what is that fight of God in Chrift, which is the privilege of his people in their folemn approaches to him.-There is a twofold folemn approach of God's people to him.-There is a right approach,

1. When God calls them up to the mount of myrrh, where our Lord abides till the day break,

Song,

Song, iv. 6.; when he calls them to come up to the hill of God in Immanuel's land, where ftands the King's palace, namely, heaven. This call comes to the believing foul at death. Then, as Rev. iv. 1. there is a door opened in heaven to the heaven-born foul, which is now, as it were, wrestling in a mire of corrupt flesh and blood in the body, and the voice is heard, Come up hither. This will be a folemn approach when the foul of the meaneft believer fhall go up thither, attended with a company of holy angels, and, like Lazarus, be carried by them into Abra. ham's bofom, Luke, xvi. 22.-It will come to both fouls and bodies of believers at the laft day: Pfal. 1. 5. "Gather my faints together unto me; those that have made a covenant with me by facrifice." And then God's covenant-people, who dwell in the duft, fhall awake from their fleep, come out of the lowly darkfome houfe of the grave, and enter into the King's palace, Pfal. Ixv. -Then they fhall fee God in Chrift to the completing their happiness for ever. Then they fhall be like him, for they fhall fee him as he is, 1 John, iii. 2. We know little now of this fight in glory, Cor. ii. 9.; but it vaftly tranfcends all fights got of him here.-There it will be immediate, they fhall fee him face to face, 1 Cor. xiii. 12.-Perfectly transforming, 1 John, i. 2.-Everlafting, without interruption, without intermiffion. They fhall be ever with the Lord. But on this we infift not-There is a right approach,

2. When God calls them to come up to the mount of ordinances, to meet him at the facred feast, as the nobles of Ifrael in the text, and as we at this time are called, to feast on the great facrifice in the facrament. This is a folemn approach. Now, what is the fight of God

Gg 3

in

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in Christ which is the privilege here?-As to this we observe,

(1.) That it is a believing fight of God in their nature, John, i. 14. (above). The nobles faw the Son of God in human fhape, with their bodily eyes. But the great defign of it was to fhew the privilege of the faints by faith. O glorious fight! to fee God in our nature, the divine nature, in the perfon of the Son, united to our nature! O high privilege to fit at his table, and under the teaching of his Spirit, to fpell the glorious name Immanuel, God with us. O the sweetness of every letter and fyllable! God, the fountain of all holinefs and happiness, we, the fink of all fin and mifery yet God with us. The perfonal union, the foundation of the myftical union; and fo an holy God and finful creatures are united through Chrift. We obferve,

(2.) That it is a fight of this God in the place of his fpecial refidence; on the mount to which they were invited to, where he ftood, as it were, on a pavement of fapphire. It is their privilege to fee him on the mount of ordinances, at his table, the glorious place of his feet, Ifa. xxv. 6. 7. O the high privilege of the faints! We were all born under a fentence of death, to fee the Lord no more in the land of the living, and (as in Haman's cafe, Efth. vii. 8.) as the word goes out of the king's mouth, our face is covered. Some live all their days in this cafe, come to communion-tables, and go away in it. But the believer laying hold on the covenant, Chrift draws off the face-covering, and then, with open face beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, they are changed into the fame image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. They fee the bread, the Lord.

(3.) It is a fight, of the glory of the place

of

of his feet, ver. 10. It is a promise relating to gofpel-days Ifa. Ix. 13. " The glory of Lebanon hall come unto thee, the fir-tree, the pine-tree, and the box together, to beautify the face of my fanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious." The ark in the temple, and gofpelordinances in the gofpel-church. It is their privilege to fee a glory there, where the world fee none; to fee a majesty in the facrament, a fpiritual glory and heavenly luftre in the bread and wine at the Lord's table, as facred symbols of the body and blood of Christ, t Cor. xi. 29. This glory and majefty in the ordinances, muft be dif cerned by faith; and because it is beyond the ftretch of the natural eye, therefore carnal wisdom in Rome, and the church of England, has gone about to fupply its place with a great deal of external pomp, that may work upon the fenfes, defacing the fimplicity of the institution. But after all, to a fpiritual difcerner, the external glory is as far below the fpiritual glory, as artificial painting would in the eyes of the nobles have been below the natural clearness of the body of heaven.

(4.) It is a fight of God as reconciled in Chrift. They faw God, and did eat and drink as in the houfe of their friend. This is the fight to be seen in the gospel-glafs, 2 Cor. v. 18.-20. A refreshful fight to a foul pained with the fting of guilt. Chrift has died, and his blood has quenched the fire of God's wrath against the finner; fo that when on the mount he looks to the Lord, he fees as it were a clear fky under his feet: A fure token, that the ftorm is blown over, that there is peace from heaven, and an offended God is reconciled to us through his own Son.

(5.) It is a fight of God as their God. They faw the God of Ifrael. Here lay the furpaffing fweet

nefs

nefs of their fight. Such a fight got Thomas, when his faith got up above his unbelief: John, xx. 28. "My Lord, and my God," And for this fight is the facrament efpecially appointed,. that the child of God may fay, "I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himfelf for me," Gal. ii. 20. The nature of the ordinance leads to it, which brings the word preached in the general to every believing communicant in particular: "This is my body, broken for you."

Laftly, It is a fight of tranfcendent glory in him. Nothing is defcribed but what was under his feet. For fearch the univerfe, there is no perfon, no thing like him. Even what was under his feet, is described to have been as a sapphire stone. But the best things on earth are not fufficient to set. forth the glory even of this, and therefore it is added, "as if it were the body of heaven in his clearnefs." They who see him, fee that of which they can never fee the like.

WE are now,

II. To fhew what is that holy familiarity which is the privilege of God's people in their folemn ap-proaches to him.-It is a believing, holy, humble freedom before their Lord! Ephef. iii. 12. "In whom we have boldness and accefs, with confidence, by the faith of him." In the fight before us, the fenfe of their own unworthinefs; and a fight of his glory, did not mar their faith, nor put them in an unbelieving frame. They did eat and drink; neither did the familiarity of faith mar their holy fear, or make them forget their diftance; compare v. I. where they were commanded to worship afar off, which no doubt they did. E will mention fome inftances of familiarity allowed them.

1. They