the Spirit? It may be known. It ought to be known; for our all depends upon it. Heaven is ours, if we have the Spirit. Hell will be ours, if we die without him. Recollect a moment what has been said, and pray with David, "Search me, O Lord, and try my heart." You have heard for what purposes every believer receives the Spirit. He quickens the dead soul. Has he quickened you? Are you alive to God, or are you alive to sin and the world? He enlightens the mind in the truth. Do you know, distinguish, and love the truth of the gospel, or do you despise and hate it? He convinces of sin. Are you convinced and humbled for your iniquity? or do you make light of it-perhaps boast of it? He is the author of faith. Do you believe in Jesus, or do you neglect his salvation? He sanctifies the soul. Is your soul sanctified by his grace, or are you wallowing in the filth of sin? He helps the true Christian to pray. Do you know any thing of his gracious help in prayer, or do you live without prayer, or which is nearly as bad, content yourself with a lifeless form of bare words without the heart? The Spirit of God is a Comforter. Is your comfort or pleasure derived from him, or from the vanities and vices of the world? May the Lord enable you to give a serious and honest answer to these inquiries! If, as it may be feared, some of you are without the Spirit, what is your case? You belong not to Christ; you are none of his. Tremble at the dreadful thought. Die you must; and you must come to judgment too. When you see him on the awful throne, O how you will wish to belong to him, and to be owned by him. O, then, be persuaded this moment to lift up your heart to God, and say, Merciful God, give me thy Holy Spirit? He has promised to give him to those who ask. This blessed gift may yet be yours, and shall, if you sincerely desire it. "Ask then, and you shall receive; seek, and you shall find; knock, and the door shall be opened." God Almighty, in compassion to your souls, enable you to do this. And as to those who have obtained this greatest of blessings, who have the Holy Spirit, what more can be said to you? Survey the wondrous gift with grateful acknowledgment. What has God wrought! Deny not, from false humility, the heavenly benefit. Have you experienced those sacred effects of the Spirit, which have been so frequently mentioned; here then is the broad seal of the Majesty of heaven, securing your relation to Christ, and your title to mansions of glory. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; and having received the Spirit, take care to "walk in the Spirit ;" be careful not to "grieve the Spirit ;" and be concerned to bring forth "the fruits of the Spirit," which are by Jesus Christ, to the praise and glory of God.-Amen. "H SERMON X. HOLINESS. Heb. xii. 14. Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. OLY, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty ? This is the language of saints and angels in their solemn worship. Yes: the God who made us; the God who rules us; the God who will judge us; is most holy. "Who is like unto him, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?" The due consideration of God's holiness will make us serious at all times, and especially when we consider our own unholiness. Well may each of us adopt the words of the prophet Isaiah, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips; and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean. lips.' "-" Who can stand before his holy Lord God?" When God created man, he made him holy. God created man in his own image, which image was holiness; for this is the peculiar character of God. But man soon lost the glory of his nature by sin. He became an unholy being; and God, who is of "purer eyes than to behold evil, and who cannot look upon iniquity," banished him from paradise; for sin broke off the happy intimacy that before subsisted. As there can be no communion between light and darkness, so there can be no communion between a holy God and an unholy sinner. And this is the reason of what is affirmed in our text, that "without holiness no man shall see the Lord." To "see the Lord," is a description of the happiness of heaven, where all his divine. perfections will be displayed, to the admiration and delight of all the redeemed; but we cannot see him without holiness. Now God, who made man holy at first, has graciously contrived to make him holy again. This is a chief part of his great salvation; for by the blood of Christ the guilt of sin is taken away from believers; and by the Spirit of Christ they are born again, and made new creatures; that is, they are made holy, and so made meet for heaven, which is seeing God. "The pure in heart shall see God." Our business at this time is, I. To shew what holiness is. II. To prove the necessity of holiness; and, I. Let us consider the nature of true holiness.-Briefly, Holiness is the image of God restored in the soul; or, in other words, "Holiness is that purity of a man, in his nature, inclinations, and actions, which is an imitation and expression of the divine image." Observe here, holiness is purity; the contrary of that horrid defilement sin has produced in the soul of man. There are two things in sin, the guilt of it, and the defilement of it. By the guilt of it, we are liable to eternal punishment; by the defilement of it, we are made unfit to serve or enjoy God. Guilt makes us afraid. Defilement makes us ashamed. Thus Adam had both guilt and fear upon his first sin. Now, in the salvation of Jesus Christ, God has provided for taking both these away from us. The guilt of sin is wholly removed from those who believe by the blood of Christ, which made atonement for it. The filth of sin is removed, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, in all those who are born again. The purity we speak of is the purity of the heart, or nature. It is not enough that the outward actions are not impure; there can be no true holiness till the heart is purified. Now many people overlook this entirely. They think it enough, if they are good livers, as they call it, or do good works. This was the fatal mistake of the Pharisees, so severely exposed by our blessed Lord. They were very particular about meats and drinks, and washing every thing, to prevent defilement; but he charges them with washing the outside only, and taking no care of the heart: they drew nigh to God with the mouth, but their heart was far from him. Their inward part was very wickedness; they were like white-washed tombs, beautiful without, but full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. Our Lord therefore insisted upon the necessity of being born again; or being partaker of a new and divine nature. Believers are "born from above," "born of God ;" and as every child partakes of the same nature with his father, so do the new-born sons of God; they "put off, concerning the former conversation, the old man, which is corrupt, according to the deceitful lusts; they are renewed in the spirit of their minds, and put on the new man, which, after God, is created in righteousness and true holiness." Eph. iv. 22-24. The heart being thus renewed, there must of course be new dispositions and inclinations. Every nature has its proper desires and inclinations. Those of the Christian are holy, in conformity to the will of God. The alteration that grace makes is strikingly represented by the prophet Isaiah, in the 11th chapter:-"The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb; and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf, and the young lion, and the cow, and the bear, shall lie down and feed together;"—that is, wicked men, however fierce, shall be so altered by the efficacy of the gospel and grace of Christ, that they shall become meek, and gentle, and loving, even to the weakest christians. Brethren, have you experienced any change of this sort? And what must we think of persecutors, who despise religion? who hate and hurt serious people? Surely these are still lions and wolves, and cannot be esteemed the sheep of Christ. O that such may know what it is to be born again! Let us now consider briefly, what are the prevailing dispositions and inclinations of holy persons. They are under the habitual influence of the fear of God -not the fear of a slave, but the fear of a child. God has put his fear into their hearts; so that, instead of living without him, and contrary to him, as once they did, they are in the fear of God all the day long. They know that his eye is upon them; they set him always before them; and their desire is, to please and glorify him in all they think, and speak, and do. Again, They are humble. Humility is the root of all other graces, and the only soil in which they will grow. They know themselves; they know the plague of their own hearts; they are conscious of innumerable sins, to which the world are strangers. The remembrance of sins committed in their carnal state covers them with shame: and the sense of much remaining corruption keeps them low in their own eyes; so that they not only lie in the dust before God, but they are kept from despising their neighbour. If they differ from the worst of mankind, they remember that grace alone made them to differ. Thus, being converted, they receive the kingdom of heaven as little children, and learn to live constantly dependent on the wisdom, grace, and power, of their heavenly Father. Once more, Holy persons are spiritual and heavenlyminded; for "to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace." Faith has led them to regard future and eternal things far above the vanities of time; for that faith by which they now live, is "the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen." "That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.' Their minds are disposed to prefer spiritual to carnal things. When engaged in spiritual duties they are in their element; and, at times, can look down with becoming indifference on all the trifles of time. Their “ sation is in heaven." By the cross of Christ "the world is crucified to them;" that is, they are no more delighted with the world, than a good man would be with the rotten carcase of a malefactor; and they likewise are crucified to the world;" the world can act upon them with no greater efficacy, than the objects of sense upon a dead person. ས conver But above all, Love, is the grand prevailing disposition of holy persons. Without love, all attainments and professions are vain. God says, "My son, give me thine heart;" and the believer replies "Take my poor heart, and let it be |