of sin; " and what wonder, that it should be certain term of years. This metaphysical "a body of humiliation?" Sin has laid it argument, therefore, though seemingly no low, even to the dust. Pamper it with the more than a difficulty proposed as to the luxuries of sea and land, array it in gold and manner of our resurrection, really strikes diamonds, it will be still the same. Only un- at the truth of the article of Christ's resdraw the curtains of affliction, and you view urrection, and is calculated to darken the it languishing upon the bed of sickness; un- counsel and revelation of the Most High lock the doors of the grave, or enter the by words without knowledge; so much secret recesses of the charnel-house, and you without knowledge, that the plain matter behold it stripped of the world's tinsel pomps of fact is a sufficient answer. Jesus Christ and vanities, reduced to putrid flesh, moulder- was laid in the sepulchre, and the same ing dust, and dry bones; no longer able to Jesus Christ arose out of the sepulchre. disguise or disown its original; brought at And if it were so with his natural body, last to know itself, and introduced to an ac- why should it be otherwise with his mystiquaintance proper for it, "earth to earth, cal? The Scriptures are clear that it will ashes to ashes, dust to dust." Here then, O not. For as they who are alive at Christ's thou, whosoever thou art, that delightest to coming, are to be "changed in the twinkcontemplate the dignity and rectitude of hu- ling of an eye;" and consequently, that man nature, here sit down, and begin thy body must be changed which is found at meditations. Is it thus, that virtue is its own the instant of his coming, and no other; so reward? Or say, is the body no part of the man? If it be, why is it in this state? Or how is it to be changed? Men talk much of the moral sense. Can the moral sense acquaint us with the resurrection of the dead? Reason is placed on the throne, and her kingdom, it is said, ruleth over all. Can reason discover the change of corruption into glory? We know she cannot; and when she spake upon the subject at Athens, her language was, “What will this babbler say ?09 they that are in their graves shall come forth to be changed likewise, and, consequently, those bodies only must be changed that were laid in the graves. "Who shall change our vile body," says the text; therefore the vile body must be there to be changed. Otherwise it would not be a change; μeraσxyμatis, a transformation, or transfiguration, of vile into glorious, but a substitution of glorious for vile. It is this mortal, and this corruptible ; τουτο το θνητον Nay, since that time, we have heard her this very mass of mortality and corruption. muttering from the dust, by the mouth of "IT is sown, IT is raised." The same, in certain philosophers-"How are the dead short, may be said to these objectors, which raised up, and with what body do they Christ said to the Sadducees upon a like come?" With what body, O man, should occasion; "Ye do greatly err, not knowing they come, but the body with which they the Scriptures, nor the power of God." went? What body should be raised from For if you knew the power of God, you the grave, but the body that was laid in would know that he can do it; and if you the grave? Had we seen Joseph of Ari- knew the Scriptures, you know that he will mathea deposit the Redeemer of the world do it. And if they say he will do it, all in a sepulchre, and been told that Redeemer the objections in the world show but one should rise again, could any one have thing, namely, "an evil heart of unbelief" thought of asking, "with what body he in the objectors. For since the Scriptures should come?" whether with the body (and particularly the process in Ezekiel's which he had when he went with his pa- vision of the resurrection) plainly show, rents to Jerusalem, at twelve years old; that the body is first to be raised, and all or the body he had at twenty; or the body the parts of it put together, before the he had at thirty, when he began his minis- change takes place, nothing remains, but an try? Upon this subject two men, of equal atheistical denial of the power of God to abilities, might dispute, if they were to live collect the parts, and put them together; a so long, till Christ came in the clouds to denial that he who made all the things of judgment, and found them doubting wheth- impalpable dust, and beheld the substance er he were risen or not, because they could of the world, before two atoms of it were not conceive with what body he should joined; who formed the body of man out of rise, or how it was consistent with the jus- those created for that purpose, and dissolves tice of God, to raise and reward one body and disperses them at pleasure; a denial that only, when, as they apprehend, he was he can collect them again when dispersed ; a born in one body, lived in another, and suf-denial that the Almighty can do this. Only fered in a third; because, it is said, the suppose a man not ignorant of the power body undergoes a thorough change in a of God, and all difficulties vanish For * then, whether the dust lie quiet in the grave, | ceeding glorious; his face shining like the or be blown to the four winds, or be en- sun, and his raiment becoming white as the tombed in a whale, or buried in the great light. Who is not ready to say, "It is good deep, it is equally under the eye of the Om- for us to be here, to behold the fair beauty of niscient, and the power of the Omnipotent. the Lord, even the glory of God in the face These are all the storehouses and reposito- of Jesus Christ?" But here we must not ries, to be opened by him who has the keys stay, because he did not. For though, at the of hell and death, when the sea shall de-brightness before him, the cloud passed, and liver up the dead that are in it, and death the sun for a little while appeared in his and hell shall deliver up the dead that are strength, the cloud soon returned and overin them when, as the same Jonas came shadowed him, and he entered into it. He out of the whale, and the same Son of man descended from the mount of transfiguration from the heart of the earth, so the same to the heart of the earth, and then "there bodies of saints, that lay down at night, was darkness over all the land;" but he soon shall arise in the morning. God is not un-went up to an higher mountain than Tabor, righteous, that he should forget the body's was again transfigured, and introduced a day, work and labor of love. From those eyes, which no cloud shall ever overcast more. He which have poured forth tears of repent- became, as it was foretold that he should do, ance, shall all tears be wiped, and they shall" as the light of the morning when the sun be blessed with the vision of the Almighty. arises, even a morning without clouds." The Those hands which have been lifted up in world, indeed, sees him not; but to us who prayer, and stretched out to the poor, shall believe, a door is "opened in heaven, and hold the palm of victory and harp of joy. behold a throne set, like the fiery flame, and Those feet which have wearied themselves its wheels as burning fire, and one sits on it, in going about to do good, shall stand in the to look upon like a jasper, and a sardine stone; courts of the Lord, and walk in the garden his garment white as snow, and the hairs of of God, and in the streets of the new Jeru- his head like the pure wool; his eyes as a salem. That flesh which has been chas- flame of fire, and his feet like unto fine brass, tised and mortified, shall be rewarded for as if they burned in a furnace, and his counwhat it has suffered; nay, the very hairs of tenance as the sun shineth in his strength." our heads are all numbered, how much "Beloved," says St. John, "it does not more, then, the parts of our bodies? yet appear what we shall be;" but this we This," says the Resurrection himself, "is know, that "when he shall appear, we shall my Father's will that has sent me, that of by like him, for we shall see him as he is," and ALL which he has given me, IIAN & Ssdwxs be seeing him, "be transformed into the same Mo, I should lose nothing, but raise IT up image, from glory to glory." He has power, at the last day."* We might, indeed, fol- as the text informs us, to subdue all things to low the objectors to the resurrection into himself, because he is the Almighty God, and the cold obscure of metaphysic. But this power he will exert on our bodies. Yet what has been alleged from the Scriptures, a little while, and he will rend the heavens, and the power of God revealed in those and come down, and heaven and earth will Scriptures (the only topics of argumenta- be filled with the overflowing flood of the tion upon subjects of this nature,) overturns the foundation of every thing the objectors have to offer; and it will, I presume, be much more profitable, to lay open from the Scriptures the manner in which this change is to be wrought. majesty of his glory, "as the waters cover the sea;" the heavens over our heads melting away before it, and the mountains flowing down, in liquid fire, at its presence. At that instant, "when the shriek of millions, fearfully crying out, shall mingle with the trumpet of the archangel, with the thunders of the departing heavens, and the noise of a world shaking into dissolution," at that instant, the dead shall be raised, and we shall be changed." Changed-not by the corruptible being taken away, and the incorruptible being introduced in its room, but by a superinduction of the incorruptible upon the cor The greatness of the change appears from this, that "our vile body is to be fashioned like unto Christ's glorious body." Of this he was pleased to give a specimen to Peter and James and John, and, in them, to all his disciples who, by faith and devotion, will accompany their Master, in "the body of HIS humiliation," to the top of Mount Tabor. There they may behold an ensample of this most amazing change; the power of the * See the resurrection of the body in an ingenious Highest, which dwelt in Christ, diffusing it- and beautiful manner illustrated from the transfiguself outwardly, till he appeared all over ex-ration of Christ, by the reverend Mr. HOLMES, in his excellent sermon on that subject. * John, vi. 39. † 2 Sam, xxiii. 4. ‡ Dan. vii. 9. x. 6; Rev. i, 14. some ideas of our approaching glorification. Nothing earthly can fully represent that which is changed from earthly to heavenly, for "the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead." There is one glory of the Sun of Righteousness, another glory of the moon, his church, walking in the brightness she receives from him, and another glory of the stars, his saints; for here also one differeth from another star in glory. All stand in their order, in shining circles, round the throne of the Sun. There these morning stars sing together unto the Lord a new song, and all the sons of God, even the children of the resurrection, shout for joy; for they rest not day nor night, making one sound to be heard through all the heavenly courts-Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come! Heaven and earth are full of thy glory. Glory be to thee, O Lord, Most High! ruptible. For thus says the apostle-"We | in which it was imprisoned, and "arise, and that are in this tabernacle do groan earnestly, be enlightened, and its light shall come; the desiring to be clothed upon with our house day-spring from on high shall visit it, and dewhich is from heaven. Not for that we stroy the covering cast over all people," and should be unclothed," or lose the earthly body, array universal nature with a robe of glory "but clothed upon," with a superinvestiture of and beauty, raising those that sleep, to behold the house from heaven, namely, the divine themselves and the world changed from darklight, which is to enwrap and invest the mor- ness to light, and calling them up to give tal body, as a garment. And not only invest glory to God and think of the resurrection. it outwardly, as a garment, but, by the divine Happy are they, who make this use of it. energy of its almighty power, penetrate and God shall help them, when that morning appierce through and through its most intimate peareth, of which every morning has been substance, till it has converted, subdued, work- to them a blessed prelude; to such, day unto ed, and changed it all into itself, so that mor- day uttereth the word of the everlasting Gostality is swallowed up of life, and corruption pel, and night unto night showeth the knowquite absorbed and lost in the ocean of the ledge of salvation. They understand how all-encircling glory. Then shall the right-"the heavens declare the glory of God" in eous be seen standing, victorious, through the felicity of his chosen, and furnish us with faith in Jesus, transformed (to compare the things of this world with those of another) from the darkness of dust and ashes, to the clear transparency of glass, the pure lustre of diamonds, the inconceivable agility of light, and the perfect impassibility of heaven. No reasonable man can complain, that the Scriptures are not explicit enough upon the subject. But the transformation of mortality into glory is one of those things of God, which the natural man never will know, nor discern. Though, surely, if nature teach any religion, it is the Christian; if she preach any doctrine, it is this resurrection and change. And were not the book of nature, as well as that of grace, become a sealed book, what man that ever travelled with the earth through the vicissitudes of a year, could deny a resurrection? Ask the furrows of the field, and they shall tell thee. For "except a corn of wheat fall into the ground, and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." The parts of the seed cannot spring afresh till they have been first dissolved. It is true, the husbandman soweth only bare grain; but it arises "clothed upon" with a beautiful verdure. And "if God so clothe the grass of the field," how much more shall he clothe your mortal bodies with a glorious immortality, Oye of little faith? But why need we take the compass of a year? Every twenty-four hours there is a rehearsal, in nature, of man's death and resurrection. Every evening, the day, with its works, dies into darkness and the shadow of death. All colors fade, all beauty vanishes, all labor and motion cease, and every creature, veiled in darkness, mourns, in solemn silence, the interment of the world. Who would not say, " It is dead, it shall not rise!" Yet, wait only a few hours, in faith and patience, and this dead and entombed earth, by the agency of Heaven upon it, shall burst asunder the bars of that sepulchral darkness Wherefore, my beloved brethren, seeing these our bodies are to become instruments of glory hereafter, how ought they to be instruments of grace here! for grace is the dawn of glory, as glory is the meridian of grace. Seeing we are to have such bodies, what ought our souls to be, for whom such bodies are prepared! And how ought we to spend our short moment of probation in "cleansing ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God!" The consideration of our glorious change cannot but make our hearts to burn within us. And then is the time to reflect, that blessed is he, whose soul is changed from grace to grace, for his body shall be changed from glory to glory. And if the soul of a Christian be ever "transformed by the renewing of his mind," it must be, not while he is in call ever freely and voluntarily withdrew for one hour, to attend the business of changing their souls from sin to righteousness, that so their bodies may be changed from dust to glory. And if this question, from the mouth of the all-seeing Judge, will strike the unprofitable servant speechless at his footstool, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? Let us consider this, and be wise unto salvation, and in every thought, word, and action, remember our latter end. Let us remember, that "our Redeemer liveth, and that he shall indeed stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though after our skin, worms destroy this body, yet in this flesh shall we see God." And may we so "look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ," by the eye of faith, that when we see him. as he is, he may "change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working, whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself." DISCOURSE XVIII. THE UNSPEAKABLE GIFT. EPHESIANS, IV. 7. Unto every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the gift of Christ. THE church, having in the course of her holy offices led us through all the different stages of the life of Christ, from his advent in the flesh to his death on the cross, and from thence to his glorious resurrection and triumphant ascension, has now at length brought us to the celebration of that joyful festival, wherein she proposes to our meditation the blessed fruit and crown of her Redeemer's labors, the effusion of the Spirit from on high. And with good reason it is, that she calls us together more than once, to contemplate this greatest of God's mercies, from which alone we derive all our power and ability to contemplate the least of them. For though it was Christ who died, and rose, and ascended, it was the Spirit that proclaimed the news of his having done so to the world; though it was Christ who wrought our salvation, it was the Spirit that communicated the knowledge of it to the sons of men, and makes that knowledge effectual in their hearts. To his de scent we owe the publication of the glad tidings, and the conversion of the nations that were once "afar off, but are now made nigh by the blood of Jesus,* having access by one Spirit to the father." They that dwell in the uttermost parts of the earth have been struck with an holy fear and reverential awe at the signs and miracles of Jesus, and from thence have been heard songs, even Glory to the Righteous Redeemer and Judge of the world; since even these isles of the Gentiles sing the praises of Jehovah, and glorify the Lord God of Israel in his church, as it is at this day. Every good and perfect gift," saith St. James, "is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." The variableness and the shadow of turning are only in man. The Father of lights, like * Ephes. ii. 13. + Ephes. ii. 18 his glorious representative the sun, shines | Peter uses the same form of expression, evermore with the same unvarying bright- when he says to Simon Magus, "Thy ness and benignity, sending down his good money perish with thee, because thou hast and perfect gifts, as the sun does his light, thought that the gift of God might be puron all. At the beginning, when God had chased with money." As it came down. finished his wonderful and glorious works, from the Father of lights, it is more preand pronounced them to be good, he made cious than fine gold, and all the things a deed of gift of the whole to his creature which are the objects of man's desire upon man, who might have continued, as he was earth are not to he compared unto it. placed, in the light of his heavenly Father's Wherefore St. Paul says of it, "Thanks be countenance. But by sin man turned away to God for his unspeakable gift;"† a gift, from God, as the earth does from the sun; which no tongue of man could treat of as and therefore, stripped of all the good and it deserved; so that a new set of tongues, perfect gifts of glory and beauty, he sat endued with the force and activity of fire, desolate and disconsolate, in the shadow of were sent from heaven, to display and dedeath. scribe to the world the glories of this mani Sin having thus occasioned a general for-fold grace of God. feiture, man has now more reason than ever But we are to consider the Giver of this to acknowledge every good thing he enjoys unspeakable gift, which is Christ; "the to be a free gift of God, coming down from gift of Christ," says the text. And it could above. And accordingly we find, that a be the gift of no other, because man having right notion of this matter is one of the by rebellion forfeited the original grant, the marks which characterize a believer, and attainder must be taken off before the grant distinguish him from a man of the world. could be renewed. Christ only could take The one speaks of possessing as his own, off the attainder, and therefore Christ only what the other acknowledges to have re- could renew the grant. And as he did received from God. "Soul," saith the carnal new the grant, it is plain he has taken off worldling in the Gospel, "thou hast goods the attainder. He died on the cross to atone laid up for many years. "What hast for sin; he arose from the grave to show thou," saith St. Paul, "that thou didst not that the penalty was paid to the uttermost receive?" The language of Esau is, "I farthing, because the surety was released have enough." Jacob speaks in another and set free for ever; he ascended to plead style; "The good things which God hath the merits of what he had done for his given me."§ Pilate interrogates Christ, brethren; and he sent down the Spirit upon Knowest thou not that I have power to the church, to demonstrate the acceptance crucify thee, and I have power to release of those merits, since he who pleaded thee?" Christ replies to him, "Thou them was in full possession of the forfeited couldest have no power at all against me, riches of grace in the kingdom of heaven. except it were given thee from above."T" Wherefore he saith, When he ascended The same may be said with regard to the internal goods of the mind, as well as the external advantages of body or fortune. The heathen who knows not God, or his gifts, calls his supposed virtue E, a habit, an acquisition of his own; the Christian speaks of his real holiness in no other style than that of deals, or donu, a gift from God. And this gift of holiness, or of the Spirit, whose title is the Holy One, was indeed the good and the perfect gift, the joy, the crown, and the glory of all gifts; insomuch that Christ calls it emphatically "THE gift of God," saying to the woman of Samaria, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water."** St. up on high, and led captivity captive, he gave gifts unto men." When, having overcome the sharpness of death, and vanquished the powers of hell, he went up, a glorious conqueror, in triumph to his throne in heaven, then it was, that he scattered abroad the tokens of his victory, and poured forth the pledges of his munificence on the church, for which he died to purchase them. That same Jesus who was crucified, "being exalted to the right hand of God," hath shed forth those streams of the water of life, which have been flowing ever since from the throne of God and the Lamb, through the appointed channels, to water every plant and flower in the garden of God. I say every plant and flower, because "unto every one of us," as the apostle declares, "is given grace." No member of † 2 Cor. ix. 15. *Acts, viii, 20. |