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3. Betake yourselves to earnest prayer; and confess your guilt, your vileness, your liableness to divine difpleafure: cry for his Spirit to fhed abroad his love in your hearts here let your petitions centre; for this is the main thing. Endeavour to devote yourselves to him, to give up your difaffected hearts to him, to bow that rebellious foul at his feet.

4. Meditate upon the glory of God, his kindness to you, the love and fufferings of Christ, and such subjects as tend to beget and inflame your love to him.

5. Be not weary in the use of these means, but perfevere, hold on, until you find a thorough change produced in your hearts. Your eternal All is concerned; therefore be not remifs and careless; be not foon tired or difcouraged. Never give over until your last breath; and who knows but that hoftile fpirit of yours may foon become the friend of God, and at length fhine among His celeftial friends in all their tranfcendent glories and ineffable and eternal felicity! Amen.

SERMON XLVIII.

THE NATURE AND AUTHOR OF REGENERATION.

JOHN iii. 7. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must

TH

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be born again.

HOSE doctrines are not always moft abfurd in themselves, nor ftrange to a well-informed mind, which are most wondered at in the world. Ignorance apt to wonder, where knowledge difcovers nothing amazing or unaccountable. To fupport our obfervations, proofs might be given; but it is to my present purpose to take notice of only onc, one that excited

from

from Nicodemus wonder, about 1700 years ago, and is ftill wondered at; nay, more, is ridiculed in an ignorant world: I mean the doctrine of Regeneration, or the New Birth.

Nicodemus comes to Chrift with a conviction of his high character as a Teacher from God, who attested his commiffion by the ftrong and popular evidence of miracles. From fuch a Teacher he expects fublime inftructions; and from his own improvements in Jewifh learning, he, no doubt, flatters himfelf he fhall be able to comprehend them: but when, inftead of gratifying his curiofity by telling him strange and great things of the kingdom of the Meffiah, as a fecular Prince, and a mighty Conqueror, as he and his countrymen expected, or difcourfing like a Rabbi on the Jewish law; I fay, when, instead of this, Jefus opens the conference by a folemn and authoritative declaration of the neceffity of fomething under the name of another birth, how is Nicodemus furprized! This he cannot understand. This seems strange, new doctrine to him; and he has an objection ready against it, as an absurdity and an impoffibility: How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the fecond time into his mother's womb and be born? This objection, which was altogether impertinent, and founded upon a grofs mistaken notion of the doctrine, may ferve as a fpecimen of all the objections that have been made against this doctrine ever fince; they have all proceeded from ignorance, or from grofs miftaken notions of an evident truth; and hence men have imagined, like this mafter of Ifrael, that they reasoned strongly against it, when in reality they were faying nothing at all to the purpose, and did not fo much as underftand the cafe.

Our condefcending Lord took a great deal of pains to give Nicodemus right notions of this doctrine. For this purpose he prefents it before him in various views. He tells him, he did not mean a fecond natural birth, but a birth of water and of the fpirit-a birth that renders a man fpiritual, and confequently fit for that fpiritual

fpiritual kingdom he was about to erect; and that the free and fovereign Spirit of God, the Author of this new birth, operated like the wind, which bloweth where it lifteth. Nicodemus ftill continues gazing at him, and wondering what he should mean. He is puzzled, after all, and asks, How can these things be? Jefus tells him the wonder did not lie in the doctrine, but in his ignorance of it, when he was a teacher of the law: Art thou a mafter in Ifrael, and knoweft not these things!

The connection of my text is this: That which is born of the flesh is fiefh; and that which is born of the Spirit is fpirit: therefore marvel not that I faid unto thee, ye must be born again. That is to fay, "The doctrine you are fo much furprized at, is not at all abfurd, fo as to make you wonder to hear it from my mouth. You cannot but know, that all mankind are born of the flesh; that is, propagated in a way that communicates a depraved nature to them; and hence, they are flefh; that is, corrupt and carnal, and therefore wholly unfit to be admitted into my kingdom, which is pure and fpiritual. But that which is born of the Spirit is fpirit; that is, fpiritual and holy; and therefore fit for that fpiritual and holy kingdom which I am come to fet up. Now, if this be the cafe, you have certainly no need to marvel at this doctrine: can it feem ftrange to you, that impure, unholy creatures must be changed, before they can be fit members of fo holy a fociety? Can you marvel at this? No; you would have more reafon to marvel at the contrary.'

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It is one part of my design to-day to inquire, whether the doctrine of the new birth be indeed such a strange, abfurd, or impoffible thing in itfelf, as to deferve that amazement, and indeed contempt, which it generally meets with in the world: or whether it be not rational, neceffary, and worthy of univerfal acceptance? But before I enter upon this, it will be proper to inquire, What the new birth is? And,

Who is the author of it?

And in what way does he generally produce it?

Remove your prejudices, my hearers, against this doctrine, fufpend your difbelief, and ceafe to wonder at, or ridicule it, till these points be explained, left you be found to speak evil of the things you know not. I. Let us inquire, What it is to be born again?

To gain your attention to this inquiry, I need only put you in mind, that whatever be meant by the new birth, it is not an infignificant fpeculation, not the difputed peculiarity of a party, not the attainment of a few good men of the first clafs, but it is effential to every good man, and abfolutely neceffary to falvation. You cannot doubt of this, if you look upon Jefus Christ as a perfon of common veracity, and worthy of credit in his moft folemn declarations; for he has declared, over and over again, with the utmost folemnity, that Except a man be born again, he cannot fee the kingdom of heaven. John iii. 3, 5, and 7. Attend then, if you think your eternal falvation worthy of your attention.

The phrafe, to be born again, like most other expreffions ufed upon divine fubjects, is metaphorical, and brings in natural things, with which we are familiarly acquainted, to affift our conceptions of divine things, which might otherwise be above our comprehenfion. We all know what it is to be born; and our knowledge of this may help us to understand what it is to be born again. As by our firft birth we become men, or partake of human nature; fo, by our fecond birth we become chriftians, and are made partakers of a divine and spiritual nature. As our first birth introduces us into this world, and into human fociety, fo our fecond birth introduces us into the church of Chrift, and makes us true members of that holy fociety. As by our firft birth we resemble our parents, at least in the principal lineaments of human nature; fo by our second birth we are made partakers of the divine nature; that is, we are made to refemble the bleffed God in holinefs; or, as St. Paul expreffes it, we are renewed after his image in knowledge, righteoufnefs, and true holiness. Eph. iv. 24. Col. iii. 10. The effect is

like its caufe; the child like the parent. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is fpirit. * In our firft birth we are endowed with child-like and filial difpofitions towards our human parents; and when we are born of God, we are infpired with a child-like and filial temper towards him, as our heavenly Father. By our natural birth we are placed in an imperfect, but growing state. We have all the powers of human nature, though none of them in perfection; but from that time they grow and improve, till they at length arrive to maturity. In like manner, in our second birth, all the principles of virtue and grace are implanted; but their growth and improvement is the work of the chriftian life; and from that time they continue gradually growing, tho' with many interruptions, till at death they arrive at maturity and perfection. In our natural birth we pafs through a very great change. The infant that had lain in darkness, breathlefs and almost infenfible, and with little more than a vegetative life, enters into a new state, feels new fenfations, craves a new kind of nourishment, and discovers new powers. In like manner, in the second birth, the finner paffes through a great change; a change as to his view of divine things; as to his temper, his practice, and his state; a change fo great, that he may with propriety be denominated another man, or a new creature. As I fhall adjuft my discourse to the narrow limits of an hour, I must pass over, or but flightly touch upon all the particulars fuggefted by the metaphor in my text, except the laft, which is the moft comprehenfive and inftructive; namely, That the new birth implies a great change in the views, the temper, the practice, and the state of the finner; and under this head, fundry of the other par ticulars may be reduced.

The various forms of expreffion, which the fcripture uses to reprefent what is here called a fecond birth,

Flefh of flesh, and fpirit of fpirit. This is according to the efta

blished laws of generation, by which every thing begets its like.

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