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any of his faving benefits. If you have an interest in hiin, you are united to him, as I have already demonftrated. If you have not an interest in him, you have no plea to make for juftification and acceptance with God upon his account. Our Lord Jefus Chrift has indeed made a fufficient atonement for fin. He has wrought out a perfect righteousness for finners, whereby they may be acquitted from guilt, reconciled to God, and freely juftified in his fight. But what is this to impenitent unbelievers, who have never been drawn to Chrift by the powerful influences of his holy Spirit, who have never received him by faith, fo have never belonged to him; and therefore could never have any part in either his active or paffive obedience. If a man abide not in me (fays our bleffed Lord) he is caft forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them and caft them into the fire, and they are burned, John xv. 6. This therefore is a fufficient evidence of the truth of what I have before writ ten to you upon the doctrine of juftification. We cannot be justified by works. We cannot be justified by a conformity to any imaginary law of grace, without a vital union to Chrift by faith. For be that believeth not is condemned already, John iii. 18. And he that hath not the Son of God hath not life, 1 John v. 12. But then on the other hand, being united to his perfon, we are united to his benefits; and partake with him in all the merits of his obedience, in his righteoufnefs, victories, graces, and inheritance. This then thews you, what neceffity there is of your acquaintance with the doctrine of our union to Chrift. There is a neceffity for it, that you may know what is the foundation of your eternal hope, how you may find acceptance with God, and how you may know Christ, and the power of his refurrection, and the fellowship of his fufferings; and be made conformable to bis death.

Moreover, our fanctification does likewife immediately and neceffarily depend upon a vital union unto the Lord Jefus Chrift. The fcriptures do indeed exhort us to be holy, as our Father which is in heaven is holy and to that end exhort us, to watch and pray, to crucify our flesh with its affections and lufts, to mortify our memhers which are upon earth; and to place our affections

upon things that are above; and to the like exercises of religious duty. But they no where exhort us to attempt these in our own ftrength; or to expect a renewed nature by any performance of them within our pow-: er. To attempt our fanctification merely by our endeavours, were to prefs oyl out of a flint. For in the Lord, fball men fay, we have righteousness and ftrength: his grace, and that only is fufficient for us; and without him we can do nothing. I have fhewn you, that all fupplies of grace are treasured up in Chrift for us; and that we are to receive them all out of his fulness. How then can we partake of them, whilst estranged and difunited from him? Can a branch cut off from the vine, bring forth fruit? No more can we except we abide in him, John xv. 4. Can the branches of an olive tree, flourish without the root? Surely we cannot bear the root: but the root must bear us; and we must therefore be grafted in, if we would partake of the root and fatnefs of the olive tree, Rom. xi. 17. Can we live and act, when feparated from our life? Chrift is our life, Col. iii. 4, And untill he quicken us, we are dead in trefpaffes and fins, Eph. ii. 1. In a word, our carnal minds are enmity to God, we are altogether as an unclean thing; and when love to God can be the production of enmity it self; and purity and holiness, of nothing but defilement and uncleannefs; then, but not till then, can we be holy without an union to Jefus Chrift. If therefore, you would obtain that holiness, without which no man can fee the Lord, you must with active diligence repair to him for it. You must by faith depend upon him as the fountain of all grace. You must receive all from him and give him the glory of all you receive.

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Our communion with God does likewife wholly depend upon our union to Jefus Chrift. I have already Thewn you, that all fanctifying grace is derived from our union to Jefus Chrift; and I think, I need not use arguments to prove, that we cannot exercise grace before we have it. All quickening, comforting, ftrengthning grace must derive from the fame fource, as con

verting and fanctifying grace does. Would you be humbled and abafed before God, you must learn of Christ to be meek and lowly of heart, Mat. xi. 29. Would

you have your affections placed upon things above, you muft remember, that you are dead, and that your life is hid with Chrift in God, Col. iii. 2, 3. Would you have enlargement of foul, and cheerful hope in God's mercy, when you approach his prefence, Chrift in you is your hope of glory, Col. i, 27. In whom you may have boldness and accefs with confidence by the faith of him, Eph. iii. 12. And be accepted in the beloved, Eph. i. 6. Would you enjoy the earnest of your future inheritance, it must be upon your believing in him, that you are fealed with that holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of your inheritance, Eph. i. 13, 14. Would you have joy and peace in believing, you must rejoice in Chrift Jefus, without confidence in the flefb, Phil. iii. 3. Would you have the communications of the divine love to your foul, it must be from Chrift's loving you; and manifefting himfelf to you, John xiv. 22. To conclude, certain it is, that without union there can be no communion; and: it therefore concerns you not only to confider, whether you are indeed united to Chrift, and have accefs to God through faith in him: but also, whether your deadnefs, formality, and distractions in duty, which fo often complain of, are not owing to the want of a cheerful dependance upon Chrift, as the head of influences; or else to your vain attempts to quicken your foul by fome endeavours of your own, without looking to him for the incomes of his Spirit and grace.

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I may add once more, our perfeverance in grace here, and our perfection of grace in glory, do neceffarily depend on our union to Chrift. As we are accepted in the beloved, fo it is by Chrift's dwelling in our hearts by faith, that we are rooted and grounded in love, Eph. iii. 17. We stand by faith in him, Rom. xi. 20. It is becaufe Chrift lives, that we live alfo, John xiv. 19. And if we do live, it is not we, but Chrift liveth in us,' Gal. i. 20. We have no fource of fpiritual life, but in him no stability in the exercises of the fpiritual life, but by continual supplies of grace from him. It is becaufe none can pluck us out of Chrift's hand, that we shall have eternal life; and never perifb, John x, 28. Here and here only is the believer's ftability and fecurity; he Telongs to Chrift, is a member of his body, of his flesh,

and of his bones. And will the bleffed Saviour neglect his own body? Will he leave any of his members to perish? Is it in the power of hell or earth, of fin or Satan, to prevail against him? Or can he who is the fame yesterday, to day, and for ever, change the purposes of love and eternal kindness towards thofe whom he has once loved and united to himfelf? And are not all the promises of the believer's perfeverance, yea, and amen in Chrift, with whom the believer is one myftical and fpiritual perfon? Sooner thall heaven and earth país away, than the bleffed Redeemer fhall forget or neglect the members of his body, and the objects of his love: they were eternally chofen in him, they are bis by covenant, they are united to him by faith, their intereft is his, and he is gone to take poffeffion of their inheritance, that where he is, they may be alfo. Thus are we kept by the power of God through faith, unto falvation. But how could we stand one day or hour against the efforts of our own corruptions, the craft, malice, and power of Satan's temptations; and the fnares and entanglements of a wicked world, if we were not founded upon this rock?

And now, Sir, you are to judge, whether there be not more than a doctrinal acquaintance with our union to Chrift neceffary for us, if we would either be justified in the fight of God, obtain that holiness without which no man can see the Lord, live near to God, or hold the beginning of our confidence ftedfaft unto the end.

By what has been faid, you cannot but fee, that it fhould be your great enquiry, how this union may be obtained, if you have not the evidence of it; or how it fhould be evidenced to yourself, if you are in doubt about it.

If you have no evidence of your union to Christ, it concerns you to realize your natural enmity of heart to God, deeply to affect your foul with a sense of the dreadful mifery of a Christless state; and to lament before God the pollution of your nature, the hardness of your heart, the guilt of your fins; and the amazing deftruction and perdition, unto which you are thereby expofed. It concerns you (as I have often advised you) to lie at mercy, to come to the footitool of fovereign grace, self

loathing and felf-condemning, pleading with importu nate ardour, for the powerful influences of the bleffed Spirit to draw and unite you to Chrift. It concerns you, to be careful and diligent in your attendance upon all the duties of religious worship; and to be ftedfast and immoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, if you would not have your labour in vain in the Lord. It concerns you, though watchful, active, and diligent, yet utterly to defpair of all help in yourfelf; and to maintain a lively impreffion, that all the progress of spi ritual life must flow from your union to Jefus Christ : and that you must therefore rely upon him only, to do all in you and for you. It likewife concerns you, to look unto Jefus Chrift, not only as a sufficient but a compaffionate Saviour, willing to receive you to mercy in your prefent ftate, how bad foever; and therefore to endeayour a chearful and immediate compliance with the gofpel offer, without waiting for moral qualifications to recommend you to the Redeemer's acceptance; and let Christ Jefus be your steady hope and confidence: whatever darkness, difficulties, trials or temptation, you may meet withal in your way.

If you are in doubt about your state; and in an un. comfortable fufpence whether you are united to Chrift or not, do not reft fatisfied in fuch a cafe, wherein your eternal ALL is at ftake, and in a precarious uncertainty. But labour to refolve your doubts, by the lively exercise of faith; and by an humble chearful confidence and delight in the blefied Saviour. Then may you know that he dwells in your heart by faith, when you are root. ed and grounded in love, Eph. iii. 17. Labour to evidence your union to Chrift, by having your heart purified by faith; and your affections fpiritual and heavenly. Then may you know that you are rifen with Chrift, when you seek thofe things which are above, where ⚫ Chrift átteth at the right hand of God, and when you place your affections on things above, and not on things on the earth,' Col. iii. 1. 2. Labour to clear up this doubt, by the exercise of all the several graces of the Spirit of life. If you live in the exercife of faith, repentance, love to God, humility, hope in Chrift, deAre after and delight in him; if you bring forth the

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