your just enemy. And are you able to make good your cause against him who has universal nature at his nod? How dreadful is your situation! That which may make the earth rejoice, may make you fear and tremble. The Lord reigneth, let sinners tremble. You must fall before him, if you will not cheerfully submit to his government. Let me therefore renew the usual neglected declaration, "He sits upon a throne of grace." Let me once more in his name proclaim reconciliation! reconciliation!! in your ears, and invite you to return to your allegiance. Lay down your arms, forsake your sins. Hasten, hasten to him. The sword of his justice now hangs over your heads, while I am managing the treaty with you; and therefore delay not. Yield; yield, or die; surrender, or perish; for you have no other alternative. Submit, and you may join the general joy at his government. You upon earth, and devils and damned ghosts in hell, are the only beings that are sorry for it; but upon your submission your sorrow shall be turned into joy, and you shall exult "when the Lord of all comes to judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth." Psalm xcvi. 13. SERMON XVII. THE NAME OF GOD PROCLAIMED BY HIMSELF. EXOD. XXXIII. 18, 19.—And he said, I beseech thee, show me thy glory. And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee. WITH CHAP. XXXIV. 6, 7.—And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth; keeping mercy for thousands, or giving iniquity, and transgression, and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty Ir is a very natural and proper inquiry for a creature, "Where is God my Maker ?" And a heart that loves him must long to know more of him, and is ever ready to join with Moses in his petition, Show me, I pray thee, thy glory; or, "Reveal thyself to me." That thou art, I infer from my own existence, and from thy numerous works all around me; and that thou art glorious, I learn from the display of thy perfections in thy vast creation, and in the government of the world thou hast made. But, alas! how small a portion of God is known in the earth! How faintly does thy glory shine in the feeble eyes of mortals. My knowledge of things in the pre sent state of flesh and blood depends in a great measure upon the senses; but God is a spirit invisible to eyes of flesh, and imperceptible through the gross medium of sensation. How and when shall I know thee as thou art, thou great, thou dear unknown? In what a strange situation am 1! I am surrounded with thy omnipresence, yet I cannot perceive thee: thou art as near me as I am to myself; "thou knowest my rising up and my sitting down; thou understandest my thoughts afar off; thou penetratest my very essence, and knowest me altogether." Psalm cxxxix. 2, &c. But to me thou dwellest in impervious darkness, or which is the same, in light inac cessible. "O that I knew where I might find him! Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: on the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him he hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him." Job xxiii. 3. 8, 9. I see his perfections beaming upon me from all his works, and his providence ever-active, ruling the vast universe, and diffusing life, motion, and vigor through the whole the virtue of his wisdom, power and good ness, Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze; Inspires our soul, informs our vital part.--POPE. But where is the great Agent himself? These are his works, and they are glorious: "in wisdom has he made them all," but where is the divine Artificer? From these displays of his glory, which strike my senses, I derive some ideas of him; but O! how faint and glimmering how unlike to the all-perfect Arche type and Original! I have also heard of him by the hearing of the ear; I read his own descriptions of himself in his word; I contemplate the representations he has given of himself in his ordinances; and these are truly glorious, but they are adapted to the dark and grovelling minds of mortals in this obscure region, and fall infinitely short of the original glory. I can think of him; I can love him; I can converse and carry on a spiritual intercourse with him; I feel him working in my heart; I receive sensible communications of love and grace from him; I dwell at times with unknown delight in the contemplation of his glory, and am transported with the survey: but, alas! I cannot fully know him; I cannot dive deep into this mystery of glory; my senses cannot perceive him; and my intellectual powers in the present state are not qualified to converse with spiritual objects, and form a full acquaintance with them. O! if it would please my God to show me his glory in its full lustre! O that he would reveal himself to me so that my senses may assist my mind; if such a manner of revelation be possible! Such thoughts as these may naturally rise in our minds; and probably some such thoughts possessed the mind of Moses, and were the occasion of his request, I beseech thee show me thy glory. These chapters, whence we have taken our subject of discourse, present us with transactions that must seem very strange and incredible to a mind that knows nothing of communion with the Father of spirits, and that is furnished only with modern ideas. Here is, not an angel, but a man; not a creature only, but a sinner, a sinner once depraved as ourselves, in intimate audience with the Deity. Jehovah speaks to him face to face, as a man speaketh to his friend. Moses uses his interest in favor of a rebellious people, and it was so great that he prevailed: nay, to show the force of his intercessions, and to give him an encouragement to use them, God condescends to represent himself as restrained by this importunate petitioner, and unable to punish the ungrateful Israelites, while Moses pleaded for them, "Let me alone," says he," that my wrath may wax hot against this people, that I may consume them." Exod. xxxii. 10. Moses urges petition upon petition; and he obtains blessing upon blessing, as though God could deny nothing to such a favorite. He first deprecates the divine wrath, that it might not immediately break out upon the Israelites, and cut them off, verses 11-14. When he has gained this point, he advances farther, and pleads that God would be their Conductor through the wilderness, as he had been till that time, and lead them into the promised land. In this article God seems to put him off, and to devolve the work of conducting them upon himself; but Moses, sensible that he was not equal to it, insists upon the request, and with a sacred dexterity urges the divine promises to enforce it. Jehovah at length appears, as it were, partly prevailed upon, and promises to send his angel before him as his guide. Chap. xxxii. 34, and xxxiii. 2. But, alas! an angel cannot fill up his place; and Moses renews his petition to the Lord, and humbly tells him that he had rather stay, or even die where they were in the wilderness, than go up to the promised land without him. If thy presence go not with me, carry us up not hence, chap. xxxiii. 15. "Alas! the company of an angel, and the possession of a land flowing with milk and honey, will not satisfy us without thyself." His prayers prevail for this blessing also, and Jehovah will not deny him anything. O the surprising prevalency of faith! O the efficacy of the fervent prayer of a righteous man! And now, when his people are restored unto the divine favor, and God has engaged to go with them, has Moses anything more to ask? Yes, he found he had indeed great interest with God, and O! he loved him, and longed, and languished for a clearer knowledge of him; he found that after all his friendly interviews and conferences he knew but little of his glory; and now, thought he, it is a proper time to put in a petition for this manifestation; who knows but it may be granted! Accordingly he prays with a mixture of filial boldness and trembling modesty, I beseech thee, show me thy glory; that is to say, "Now I am in converse with thee, I perceive thou art the most glorious of all beings; but it is but little of thy glory I as yet know. O! is it possible for a guilty mortal to receive clearer discoveries of it? If so, I pray thee favor me with a more full and bright view." This petition is also granted, and the Lord promises him, "I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee." That you may the better understand this strange history, I would have you observe a few things. 1st, In the earliest ages of the world, it was a very common thing for God to assume some visible form, and in it to converse freely with his servants. Of this you frequently read in the history of the patriarchs, particularly of Adam, Abraham, Jacob, &c. It is also a tradition almost universally received in all ages, and among all nations, that God has sometimes appeared in a sensible form to mortals. You can hardly meet with one heathen writer but that you will find in him some traces of this tradition. Upon this, in particular, are founded the many extravagant stories of the poets concerning the appearances of their gods. Had there been no original truth in some appearances of the true God to men, there would have been no color for such fables; for they would have evidently appeared groundless and unnatural to every reader. This tradition therefore was no doubt originally derived from the appearances of the Deity, in a corporeal form, in early ages. * Sometimes God assumed a human shape, and appeared as a man. Thus he ap peared to Abraham, in company with two angels, Gen. xviii. and that good patriarch entertained them with food a travelers; yet one of them is repeatedly styled the Lord, or Jehovah, the incommunicable name of God; sce verses 13, 20, 22, 26, &c., and speaks in a language proper to him only, verses 14, 21, &c. Sometimes he appeared as a visible brightness, or a body of light, or in some other sensible form of majesty and glory. Thus he was seen by Moses in the bush as a burning fire; thus he attended the Israelites through the wilderness, in the symbol of fire by night, and a cloud by day; These appearances were probably made in the person of the Son, and might be intended as a prelude or earnest of his assuming human na tare in the fulness of time, and his dwelling among mortals. He was the mmediate Agent in the creation of the world; and the Father devolved upon him the whole economy of Providence from the beginning; and hence he had frequent occasions to appear on some grand design. It cannot seem incredible that he should this assume some visible form to such as believe that God was at length really manifested in the flesh; for this temporary apparent incarnation cannot be deemed more strange than his really being made flesh, and duelling among us. |