-to raise you above yourselves-to | brother, all that you want of tendersend into your hearts peace. Myness, all that you want of such love poor brother, how do you stand with as a nursing mother never can give GOD? What think ye of this, ye poor her child, that the Lord Jesus has for thoughtless souls that hear me-how you. In all your affliction, he is do you stand before Gop? Can you afflicted; in all your poverty, in one stand alone? Your mere notions of sense he is poor, he careth more for religion-your dead faith-your ordi- you than you ever cared for yournances without profit; the mere cut-selves. ting off of gross sins then will not stand by you in the day of wrath. Do you stand before God in Christ? Have you fled to him for refuge? Are you believers in him? Though your feet be as a child's, the weakest of the weak, and the feeblest of the feeble, yet can you betake yourselves in all your feebleness to Christ? Blessed thought! Though GOD sees more sin in you in one moment than you can see in yourselves through all eternity, yet, because you have a perfect mediator in Christ, he seeth not one sin upon you-he remembers it no more he blots it out as a cloud-he casts it behind his back; it shall be sought for, but it shall not be found. Oh, I turn to the holy spotless work of Christ, that can present such poor sinners as you and I are, spotless in the sight of the holy, holy, holy sinhating God!

Do you want sympathy? He is the medium of all sympathy. Let me ask my hearers one question. Do you find sin any great help in your own sympathy? Do you find that, having a sinful nature helps you to much tenderness of feeling? Do you not find that your great sin is your selfishness? and that is the true product of your sinful nature. My dear

Besides this, He is medium of glory —of grace here, of glory hereafter. But I cease-May the Lord condescend to bless these concluding words! I only expected I should throw out some few materials for after-thought, and should any of God's children desire it, I should be most glad to meet them and talk with them on these points of truth. I am no skilful fencer, rather a man that wields the flail than bears the foil; but I should be glad to see any man prove to me that the flesh, if it remaineth flesh, does not, must not, act according to its own nature; if it does not act according to its own nature, whether it does not cease to be flesh. If you will persuade a vulture not to love carrion, then I will believe that the flesh can still remain flesh, and not be fleshly. GOD, in his mercy, pardon what there has been of self in this sermon. I have desired to labour in some small degree for the truth, but I would desire to stand up for it in the meekness of the truth. If I have given unnecessary pain to any, they must forgive me: but, for the truth's sake, I would regard neither friend nor foe.

May the God of Jesus lay it on your hearts, and give us his blessing!

A Sermon,

DELIVERED BY THE REV. B. NOEL,

AT ST JOHN'S CHAPEL, BEDFORD ROW, NOVEMBER 11, 1832.

Colossians i. 14-17.-" In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins. Who is the image of the invisible God, the first born of every creature; for by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth visible, and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him. And he is before all things, and by him all things consist."

human conception-might have questioned whether the views were not too glorious to be indeed true-might have been mistaken on a point which was essential to our eternal welfare. God has given, in mercy, such evi

OUR Saviour having been sent of GOD, in his original and eternal benevolence, to save a ruined race which must otherwise have perished, in discharging his mission came on earth, and witnessed to the truth, and was an example to all his disciples of per-dence; and there is a profusion and a fect obedience to the will of GOD. Before he presented himself to death, as a sacrifice, to expiate for their sins, he thus gave them an example of perfect human excellence. But before we examine the various characters of his ministry upon earth, it is right that we should bear in mind that this person, whose glory and bright example we are called to imitate, was, indeed, incarnate GOD. The remembrance of this truth will serve to endear all the most august displays of his virtue upon earth; and likewise make us to view, with veneration and gratitude, the very infirmities and weaknesses to which he consented, not in the absence of power, but in the manifestation of infinite condescension.

So great a truth, however, that this suffering Saviour was indeed GOD incarnate, being at once so mysterious and so fundamental, would, we might expect before hand, be presented with a mass of evidence which a candid mind should not be able to resist. Otherwise the feeble mind of man might have been staggered at a vastness of mercy so much beyond

splendor of evidence in the New Testament to this great truth, that Jesus, our suffering Saviour, is incarnate GOD. Sometimes you find it stated more indirectly, sometimes directly. True it is, sometimes, the point of argumentation which the Apostle would sustain by an appeal to the authority of the Old Testament. Sometimes, again, it is assumed as a point of doctrine with which all Christians were familiar; and many are the allusions which are constantly made to it as an ascertained and universally acknowledged doctrine. We find in some places that it is declared that he is the equal of GOD,-essentially united in him; as when he said of himself, "I and my Father are one." At other times he has expressed himself to be God himself; "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with GOD, and the word was GOD." "Great is the mystery of Godliness, and GOD manifest in the flesh,” and notwithstanding what sophistry has done to invalidate them, there remain still unquestionable proofs of that greatness. Again, it is said, " To

This truth, to which we shall now confine our attention, in the examination of the passage before us, is declared, First, because it is asserted that HE REDEEMED US-“ In whom we have redemption through his blood,"

-THEREFORE HE IS GOD.

the Son he saith thy throne, O GOD, | ourselves to the examination of that is for ever and ever." A superiority one before us, which, with sufficient to angels is expressly given to him plainness, announces to us the great showing he could not be a mere man. truth, that Jesus Christ, our suffering, Again, the divine attributes are again | lowly Saviour, our teacher and our and again expressly attributed to him model, was incarnate God. -the attributes of supreme power, of omniscience, and of omnipresence; and when he was on earth he permitted divine worship to be paid for him; and there is plain proof that the primitive Christians did call on his name, offering him religious worship. Nay, he announced expressly to his disciples that it was he, who as GOD, should answer prayer-"Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, I" will do it." And when the Holy Spirit of GOD was poured forth upon the primitive church, can you conceive that a man should be its source? Yet it was Jesus, for we read,"Therefore, being by the right hand of GOD, exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he shed forth this, which ye now see and hear."

The apostle, by a mode of speaking which would be unintelligible on any other supposition, declares he is the chief of all God's gifts to men, so great, that he involves in himself the bestowment of all others. "He who spared not his own son, how shall he not give us all things ;"- -an argument which is perfectly plain, knowing, as we do, that Jesus is divine; but if he be a man, the gift of pardon-the gift of the Holy Spirit of God-the gift of heaven are inconceivably greater gifts; and so far from the gifts of the Lord Jesus being the pledge of all these higher blessings, they would remain absolutely uncertain, as far as that fact was the ground of their certainty.

But, however, the many passages which might be brought before your view, must be passed over on an occasion like this: and we must confine

In the Second place, it is asserted, because he was THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS, and therefore he is god,By him were all things created." Thirdly, it is asserted, because ALL THINGS WERE CREATED FOR HIS GLORY, AND THEREFORE HE IS GOD," All things were created by him, and for him."

Fourthly, HE IS DIVINE, because he existed before all things." And, Lastly, HE IS GOD, because "by him all things consist."

This one single passage concentrates many truths bearing on this one point, and illustrates this one fundamental truth which is announced to us that Jesus, our Saviour, is divine.

HE IS DIVINE, in the first place, this text asserts, "because we have redemption by his blood." If, indeed, the term redemption" could mean, in a less accurate signification, merely that he was the means of our rescue from suffering, the conclusion would not follow that he was divine; but it is not the accurate meaning of the word; and if reference is made to those expressions in the Old Testament, where it is said that he redeemed his people from the house of bondage; and it was asked, where was the price that was paid for this? in the first place, we would answer, that the inaccurate and figurative use of the words in a few passages, would

not justify us in other passages where | dience and love of one man be taken

there is no such inaccuracy, thus to
violate the sense of language. But
there the idea of ransom was included.
What else was the meaning of the
Almighty, when he said, "I gave
Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and
Seba for thee!" Though it is true that
Egypt was not a ransom in the precise
sense, Christ was a ransom; yet it
shows the same idea was contained in
the words, that they were redeemed
from the house of bondage. But we
are not left to dwell on the mere force
of the word “ redemption;" for the
various expressions by which this
truth is conveyed to us, show it was
a true and proper price which the
blessed Saviour paid in our stead.
"Who his ownself bore our sins in
his own body on the tree." " The
Lord hath laid upon him the iniquity |
of us all."
Thou hast made his soul
an offering for sin." "By once suf-
fering, he hath perfected for ever
them that are sanctified." Forms
which are unintelligble on any other
supposition; for, how could our
blessed Saviour have made perfectly
free from guilt those who are sanc-
tified through his instrumentality,
unless it was by bearing their guilt
away?

in the place of the obedience and love of multitudes through many generations? How could the transient sufferings of one man do away with the everlasting sufferings of myriads? Or how can we believe, that one man suffering as Jesus did, and loving GOD, and serving GoD as Jesus did, could have obliterated that dishonor done to the Divine Being by a world of transgressors through many generations? So that the atonement vanishes, the whole of redemption becomes a name, unless he who made it was indeed divine, and offered a true and proper propitiation, his sufferings of an hour being more than an equivalent for all that man would have suffered, had he never died. Jesus Christ, therefore, who made an atonement worthy of the name, an atonement on which the trembling sinner can rely, was incarnate GOD.

In the next place, our text conveys to us this truth by the statement that OUR SAVIOUR WAS THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS. "Who is the image of the invisible GOD, and the first-born of every creature: for by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth." The statement in the fifteenth verse, that our But if he were, indeed, our reLord is "the image of the invisible deemer in the true and accurate sense GOD, and the first-born of every creaof the word, to which conclusion the ture," is sustained in the sixteenth, by whole of Scripture continually com- the statement that he is the "Creator pels us to come, then must he have of all," and, therefore, "the image of been divine. If he were man, how the invisible God," and "the firstcould a man have borne away the born of every creature," in a sense in guilt of his fellow men? How could which he would not be, had he not a man render to GOD more than was been the Creator of all things. In a due to him? And if he could never lower sense, Adam was the image of surpass the amount of obedience GOD, and perfect man. Our blessed which was due to his Creator, where Saviour is here said to be the image was the superfluous homage,-where of GOD in a higher sense, which is was the superfluous obedience which proved by the truth that he was the Crecould atone for the sins of his fellow ator of all things. It was not by posmen? And if there was such a super-sessing the divine perfections merely, fluity of obedience, how can the obe- or by the human excellence of the