his angels are fighting about your hearts; the devil is holding, and a dying Saviour is drawing: O, will you not be on Chrift's fide, and with Michael may prevail, that the red dragon's head may be broken, that the devil may get a total defeat, and that Chrift may get your hearts for ever? Remember, Chrift will have none but willing fervants, Pfal. cx. 3. none but thofe who fredly offer themselves unto the Lord. Amaziah the fon of Zichri, is recorded with great honour, 2 Chron. xvii. 16. becaufe" he willingly offered himself unto the Lord." O for many Amaziahs, many fuch free will offerings, among young communicants. It would be a moft pleafant fight to God and minifters, to faints and angels, whose eyes are upon you. The firft-fruits under the law were to be offered to the Lord. "The kindness of youth is much remembred by him," Jer. ii. Young folks praying, repenting, and covenanting, are moft melodious mufic in his ears. O, give Chrift the first and best of your days, for he well deferves this. Make earnest of covenanting-work in fecret, that the communion-day may be a day of your efpoufal to the Lord Jefus, and the marriage-knot may be caft fo fure at this table, that death nor hell may never be able to loofe it.

Need I use any motives to prefs you to make this bargain, which is fo advantageous for your fouls? God invites you to treat with him, nay, he fummons you to do it, 2 Chron. xxx. 8. " Yield yourselves to the Lord," ftrike hands with God, fubmit to his mercy, accept of the terms of grace. O, that God himself would found an alarm in your ears, and fhew you the misery of an unconverted ftate!

1. While you are in this state, you have no interest in Chrift, no fhare in his blood or purchafe; you have neither art nor part in the God of Ifrael, Eph. ii. 12.

2. You are under a covenant of works, and the power, terror, threatning, and curfes of a broken law. The fentence of death is pronounced against you, and you may look for the execution of it every moment. 3. While you are out of the covenant, you have no right to any mercy, and all the mercies you receive are

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1

curfed to you, and you ftrip you of all you have.

know not how foon God may

4. Confider what a fad ftroke death gives to an uncovenanted foul. It deprives him of all mercies, temporal, fpiritual, and eternal, at one blow; and fets him agoing for ever. And whither can you flee in the day of vifitation, when nothing but grim horror and defpair do ftare you in the face? When the body is on the brink of the grave, and the foul is on the brink of hell, how will you have confidence to cry to an uncovenanted God, to whom you have been ftrangers all your days? Muft it not be terrible for an uncovenanted foul to think, I am going to appear before that God I do not know, have no intereft in, nor acquaintance with Can I look for friendship from him now, fince I never fought after it before? But, on the contrary, how pleafant then will it be for a covenanted foul to look death in the face, who can fay, I know whom I have believed, and I know whither I am going: The place I know, the way I know, and the God of that land I know? Why fhould I be backward to go to my covenanted friend, with whom I have oft converfed, been long acquainted, and in whofe prefence I have placed my happinefs?

5. Confider how lamentable your cafe will be for evermore, if you flight the prefent opportunity: The treaty will not always laft with you, nay, the day is not far off when it fhall end, and God will treat with you no longer. The door will be eternally fhut, and God will become inacceffible, inexorable, irreconcileable, for evermore: Chrift, the bleffed Mediator, will become thy implacable Judge; and, how will you look him in the face, when on the throne, whom you fo bafely flighted at a communion-table? What wilt thou do when thou findeft thyself fhut up under flaming wrath, without hope? The remembrance of loft opportunies will be as oil to thy flames. Time was, when God treated, and would have made a bargain with me, but I would not: this will be the burden of thy eternal lamentation. 0, how will you be able to bear the wrath of an uncovenanted God! Who can dwell with devouring fire? A fmall fhower of fire and brimftone lighting on our heads

now

now, would be very terrible. But O, it will be infinitely more fo, when it fhall be poured down in whole treams, and that not for a time, but for ever and ever. Will not ten thousand years fuffering do the turn? No, no; it will be eternal. Well, if you be able to dwell with everlasting burnings, you need not treat with God: But O, it is fearful to fall into the hands of the living God, one that lives, and will for ever live, to revenge himself upon you!

Hard muft your hearts be, if they be not moved by thefe threatenings; but yet harder must they be, if they be not melted by God's condefcending intreaties. Hear him, Ifa. Iv. 1. 2. 3. "Ho, every one that thirfteth, Come, &c. Incline your ear, and come unto me; Hear, and your foul fhall live, and I will make an everlafting covenant with you." Is God fo willing to make a covenant with his creature, a flave, a worm; and are you not willing to caft down the weapons of rebellion, and enter into a league with? Is it not a bargain most fuitable for you, and all your circumftances and neceffities? Is it not most glorious and honourable for you to be betrothed to fo great a prince? Hof. ii. 19. Is it not rich and advantageous for you, to be infeft in fo great an inheritance, and to have a fealed right to fuch bleffed privileges as a free pardon, gracious accefs, covenant-provifion, covenant protection, and covenantcomforts?

Object. "Alas, I have made a perfonal covenant before, but have broke it."

Anf. You have cause to be humbled for it before God; and if you be not, it is a bad fign indeed. 2. All fenfible and mourning backfliders are invited to return to him, and renew their covenant, Jer iii. endeavour to make the bargain furer than you did before.

Object. "I am afraid of breaking it over again: And is it not better not to engage?"

Anf. 1. It is good to be jealous of yourselves, and feared for breaking; for, the more you diftruft your own ftrength, the stronger you are.

2. If you covenant honeftly, you will get covenantgrace and ftrength which shall be sufficient for you; you will get the dominion of fin broke, and power to wrestle against it: And, above all, you will get Chrift engaged for you as your furety; and, to be fure, though you be weak, he is able enough.

DIRECT. XII. Labour for a thorough cleanfing of both Heart and Life from Sin, and turn unto the Lord in the ways of new obedience, before you come to the Lord's Table.

ALL that would attend a holy God, and expect a communion with him in this holy ordinance, must see to have pure hearts and clean hands, Pfal. xxiv. 3. 4. Jam. iv. 8. What was David's pious refolution, Pfal. xxxvi. 6. ought to be yours at this occafion, "I will wash my hands in innocency, and fo will I compafs thine altar, O Lord." He alludes to the ceremony of the priests washing at the brazen laver, before they ministered at the altar; to let us fee, that though this ceremony belonged only to the priests, yet the morality belongs to all; and there is a washing which concerns all before they meddle with holy fervices, and efpecially fuch as the facrament of the Lord's fupper. There is a double washing required of all communicants: I. A washing of yourselves in Chrift's blood by the actings of faith. 2. A wafhing of yourselves by the exercile of true repentance and reformation, which is an effect of the former; by the one, the guilt of fin is taken away, and by the other, the filth of fin is removed.

Now, this cleanfing muft be both external and internal, more than the outfide of the cup and platter must be washed, for God looks principally to the heart. Obferve thofe parts of the facrifice, that in a fpecial manner behoved to be washed under the law, Lev. i. 9. "But the inwards and his legs fhall he wash in water.' Now, why fhould the inwards and legs of the facrifice be washed above all the reft? Becaufe the intrails contained

tained the excrements of the beaft, and the legs and the feet did tread in the mire and puddle, and fo thofe parts were more defiled than any other part of the body. And all this to teach us, that when we draw near to God in folemn worship, we should efpecially wash there, where most filth is likely to be contracted.

1ft, Our inwards, our hearts and confciences, muft be washed: O what filth and excrements, even a dunghill of filthy lufts, lye there! Jer, iv. 14. "O Jerufalem, wash thine heart from wickednefs, how long fhall vain thoughts lodge within thee?" O communicants, you must look well to the inwards at this time, and fee to get all inward and fecret lufts washed out by repentance, and strong refolutions in Chrift's strength against them.

2dly, Our legs and feet must be washed alfo. The fteps of our daily conversation are defiled by walking and treading in foul ways: Oh, how much pollution do even believers gather by the fteps of their daily walk! And hence it is, that he who is already washed, needs daily, and upon every new occafion, to have his feet washed, John xii. 10. We should then be in earnest, before we come to the Lord's table, to have all the de filement of our outward actions washed away by true repentance, and reformation of life. Alas, that we

fhould come to this holy table with fuch inwards, and with fuch feet, as many times we have!" Lord, purge us with hyffop, and we fhall be whiter than the fnow." Our own washing will not do it, if Christ put not to his hand; yet we must be fincerely using the means, and waiting for the help of his Spirit.

If you would be fuitably prepared for this folemn or dinance, and have a gracious meeting with Chrift at his table, you must not only fearch out your fins, be deeply humbled for them, make confeflion of them before the Lord, and by faith lay hold on Chrift for pardon, as before directed; but you must alfo be wafhen and cleanfed from fin, forfake fin in your life, and caft it out of your heart: For, if you come to Christ's table with any of his enemies and traitors lodged in your bo foms, with any of your old lyfts unmortified, and fins

not