mon devotion, and maintaining the harmony of united worship.

This is truly to offer unto God, in his Holy Temple, our Selves, our Souls and Bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and lively Sacrifice unto Him; fuch, too, as we may be affured He will mercifully accept, through the mediation of his Son Jefus Chrift our Lord.

SERMON

SERMON XI.

PSALM XXV. 14.

The Secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him, and He will fhew them his Covenant.

IT

T is an old complaint, and a truth undeniable, that there are many things in fcripture hard to be underftood. Mofes, we read, put a veil over his Face, a type of that mysterious covenant which he delivered, that the Children of Ifrael could not ftedfastly look to the end of it-i. e. to the glory and fpiritual perfection of the gospel, whereunto

VOL. I.

whereunto the law of carnal commandments was only introductory. The Prophets opened their mouths in parables, they uttered dark fentences. And the doctrine of our Bleffed Saviour himself was in fome inftances fo obfcure and unintelligible, that many of his Difciples, we are told, for this very reason went back, and walked no more with Him.

But though it be true, so true, that we find it declared in the fcriptures themselves, that there are difficulties in them; yet is this no reasonable ground. of objection either against the authority or the usefulness of divine Revelation: Since all things neceffary to be known are fufficiently clear in the Holy Scriptures; and even the obfcurer parts of them are made to ferve many excellent purposes.

In the mean while it must be acknowledged, there are who ftumble at these as hard

hard fayings; there are who wreft them to their own deftruction. But who are they but the unlearned and the unstable? as the Apoftle obferves; that is to fay, men who have not learning enough. to form a right judgment in fuch matters; nor yet faith and stability enough to reft satisfied with what they do understand, and to rely on the veracity of God, who cannot deceive, for whatever is beyond the reach of their capacity.

And hence it is that these men are faid to wreft the fcriptures to their own deftruction: Because, though inability to interpret the difficult paffages of scripture may be of itself no crime; yet the not adhering to the plain and necessary doctrines revealed in them, is certainly a great one; and juftly punishable with that obduracy and error which God hath denounced against it. But-" the Secret of the Lord is with them that fear

02

fear Him, and He will fhew them his Covenant."

From which words of the Pfalmist I fhall take occafion to deduce the two following propofitions.

The First of which is -That the Fear of God, or a pious regard to the plain and intelligible duties of Religion, is the readiest way to obtain fatisfaction in the obfcurer points of it.

The Second, (which too is implied in the former)-That as many as do not properly fear God, nor obferve his ordinances, are in great danger of being difabled from ever coming to the knowledge of the Truth, and Faith in Him.-For thus much too, I think, may be fairly inferred from the text: Which, as it speci