John, "praise God day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, who was, and is, and is to come." Now what probability is there that the unregenerate, who delight in nothing but money, apparel, pleasure, eating, drinking, uncleanness, and the like; and who are such enemies to God, that they had rather be set to do any work than to spend an hour in private prayer to him every day: what probability is there, I say, that they will be able to bear their part in those sacred concerts, unless their soul be so saved from sin here, and so changed in all its faculties, that God's service and worship, which are so tedious to them now, may become the joy of their hearts.

Let none then deceive himself. As sin is death and hell begun in the unregenerate, so are holiness, eternal life, and heaven, opened in the new creature. And as sure as there will be no hell for those that are saved from their sins here, so sure it is that there will be no heaven for those who are not made partakers of the Divine nature. We might as well look for the noon of a day which never dawned, as expect to see the meridian light of glory, without having ever known the morning of regenerating grace.

4thly. We may discover the necessity of regeneration in order to salvation, if we consider the entire corruption of our nature. Our first parents, having by their fall defaced that image of God in which they were created, and being thereupon wholly polluted in soul, body, and spirit, all that come from them must be partakers of their corrupt nature. "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?" says Job. "I was born in sin," says David, "and in iniquity did my mother conceive me." "That which is born of the flesh is flesh," that is to say, carnal and unclean. "Now," says St. John, "no unclean person can enter into God's kingdom." Believe it, sinners; God will not take you from the dung hill of sin, and covered with Satan's leprosy, to place you by him on his throne. The holy land shall not be filled with filth and rottenness; and in the heavenly Canaan there are no nests for serpents and vipers; no place for backbiting, lying, slandering, or cursing Christians; no den for angry lions to lurk in; and no mire for greedy and impure swine to wallow in; much less shall the vacant thrones of fallen angels, thrown down into hell for their pride, envy, and ambition, be given to proud, envious, ill-natured, or covetous men. Rebellious aliens must not inherit the kingdom of heaven. They must first be made children, and have the Spirit of adoption, and then are they heirs, of God, and joint heirs with Christ.

Again: that we must be new creatures to enter into heaven, appears from the enjoyments of saints and angels. They are wholly spiritual. Their felicity consists in the peace of God, the love of Christ, and the joy of angels; in an uninterrupted union and communion with the Lord; a continual admiration and fruition of all his perfections. But can carnal, worldly, unregenerate people taste pleasure in any of these things? Are not such delights for them, just what pearls and diamonds are to swine? Do not they even now trample them under their feet, and sometimes turn about and endeavour to rend those that hold out to them even that heavenly bread, that food of angels? Sinners, you must then lose your taste for earthly joys, and be made capable of relishing spiritual delights, or all the pleasures of heaven will prove to you just as much as the most

melodious concert is to a deaf man, or the finest pictures to one that was born blind.

I shall conclude all these reasons with one drawn from the holiness of God's nature, which is such that no unclean person can stand in his presence. "His eyes are too pure," says a prophet, "to behold iniquity." "Evil shall not dwell with thee," says David, "neither shall the foolish stand in thy sight." There is such a contrariety between the holy nature of God, and the unholy nature of unregenerate men, that they can no more agree together than light with darkness; for "what fellowship has right. eousness with unrighteousness?" says St. Paul. A pure God with impure creatures? None at all; unless it be that which a devouring flame has with the stubble thrown therein. O sinners! learn then what the apostle means when he says, "Without holiness none shall see the Lord," lest you find him a consuming fire, as the unregenerate will most certainly do. And that you may be the more willing to get out of the state you are in by sin, let me show you the many dangers that attend it.

You are not yet a new creature, and consequently you are yet without Christ in your heart, and nothing stands between God's justice and your unregenerate soul. And for what do you expose yourself to this dreadful peril? That you may serve Satan?" He that committeth sin is of the devil," says St. John.

O that your eyes were open to see what master you have chosen, and what wages he will give you at last! Is it that you may take your chance with the rest of the world? Alas! do you not know the word of God declares, that he who loves the world is the Lord's enemy? And that this world, and all that is therein, except the souls and bodies of the regenerate, are reserved unto fire against the day of judgment? Is it that you may indulge a little longer the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eye, and the pride of life? O! if you saw them in a true light, you would renounce them as you would the service of a base and cruel tyrant, that says to you, "Do this," though it will destroy thy body, and you do it: "Do not that," though your soul should live thereby, and you do it not. Thus, like the child who was possessed by an evil spirit, you are pos sessed by carnal desires and unruly passions, which tear you and cast you sometimes into the fire, sometimes into the water, still waiting for the moment when they may plunge you into "the lake that burns with fire and brimstone."

O! do the pleasures of sin, and the smiles of the world, compensate you for the happiness of the children of God, which you renounce for them; and when the curses of God's law overtake you, will they screen from the stroke of his wrath? For though you may little think of it, if your sins are not forgiven you, a curse attends all your enjoyments. "I will curse their blessings," says God by one of his prophets. Nay, it follows you in your religious exercises. The word which you hear is cursed to you; because you believe it not, or do it not, it proves to you "the savour of death unto death;" the prayers which you make, with so much indifference and contempt for God, draw no blessing upon you; and the Lord's table is made a snare to you by your presumption: for, instead of feeding on the body and blood of Christ, you trample it under foot, and refuse to let it have its due effect upon you.

And not only so, but you are liable to temporal and eternal judgments.

In time God may let loose upon you the most dreadful sicknesses and afflictions, and you have no God to stand by you, no grace to comfort you under them. And in eternity what have you to expect but an eternal despair? and for whom is "the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone" appointed, if not for the unregenerate? And who shall have "the smoke of their torments ascending for ever and ever," if not those who never strove to enter in at the strait gate of the new birth, but remained willing servants of the prince of this world, and their unruly passions, for ever and ever? O measure, if you can, the length and breadth, the depth and height of the meaning of that word," for ever and ever;" and though all that Jesus says of that fire prepared for the devil and his angels, of that "fire which never shall be quenched," that "worm which never dieth," and that "outer darkness where there will be weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth:" though all these expressions should mean no more than an eternal fever, or an eternal confinement in a dark dungeon, will you draw this upon you for the momentary pleasure of walking according to the sight of your eye, and the desire of your heart? And will not you repent of this your unhappy choice even in this life? Ah! when death shall appear to you, and tell you that he has a message from the Lord, a warrant from the King of heaven to take from you all your worldly comforts, all the carnal pleasures and delights for which, Esaulike, you sell your birthright, and the blessing of your heavenly Father; all your nearest and dearest relations; all your wealth and honour, all your schemes of building and planting, buying and selling; and all the hopes of enjoying any longer those conveniences and superfluities, for getting of which you forget that your main business here is to be born again of the Spirit of God;-when death shall thus hurry you away from your earthly paradise; when it shall rouse your drowsy conscience, and lay before you the black catalogue of all your sins, your lies, your scoffings at virtue and religion, your goods ill-gotten and ill-spent; your profanation of the Lord's day; your speculative wantonness or actual filthiness; your vanity, pride, covetousness, sensuality; with the many years spent with so much eagerness in the devil's service; what will then your views and feelings be! And how will you lament your sin and folly, in disregarding the day of your merciful visitation! O! consider this, ere it be for ever too late.

64

SERMON VI.-Necessity of regeneration.

Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God," John iii, 3.*

THE Corruption that has overspread the Christian world as a flood, and the lukewarmness of those who distinguish themselves by some degree of seriousness, make it next to impossible to preach many of the most

Although the subject of this discourse is nearly the same with that of the preceding sermon, the reader will perceive they are two entirely different sermons. The latter is supposed to have been preached soon after Mr. Fletcher's entrance into the ministry.

important doctrines of Christianity without giving offence to some. We love to lie down as if our spiritual race was run, even before we set out in earnest. And if any one attempts to show us plainly our danger in so doing, we look upon him in general as a troublesome person who endea. vours to make us uneasy without necessity. This is one of the reasons why those who are appointed to show unto others the way of salvation dare hardly mention what Christ said of the narrowness of the way that leads to life, and the few that walk therein.

We fear to be thought uncharitable, or suspected of preaching new doctrines and this fear makes us soften, if not conceal, those parts of the Gospel which Christ and his apostles insisted upon in the plainest

manner.

Nevertheless, as we are commanded to declare the whole counsel of God, without respect of persons or fear of men, I shall now discourse on one of those points of doctrine which worldly Christians seldom make the subject of their meditations; I mean the doctrine of our regeneration or new birth in Christ Jesus. And to do it in order, I shall consider,

First, On what occasion and to whom our blessed Lord spoke the words of the text, "Except a man be born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven." In the

Second place I shall show the absolute necessity of a new birth to enter into life eternal; and

Thirdly, I shall conclude by pointing out the way to that regeneration, without which no man can see the kingdom of heaven. And may the Lord, who has promised to be with his servants to the end of the world, manifest his presence among us, and apply by his Spirit to all our hearts the important doctrine of the text which he taught himself in the days of his flesh.

And first, I am to consider on what occasion and to whom our blessed Lord spoke of regeneration.

1. Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, and no doubt one of the best of them, having heard of the miracles of Jesus, concluded that he was no mere man, but a teacher sent from God; therefore he came by night to ask him some questions concerning the kingdom of God, which every sin. cere Jew expected at that time. Our Lord, knowing that he (as well as the rest of the nation) entertained wrong notions of his kingdom, which is wholly spiritual, began by assuring him that no one unconverted could see that kingdom, much less enter into it: "Verily, verily I say unto thee, that except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

2. As if he had said, "Be not mistaken, Nicodemus, my kingdom is not such as thou thinkest, nor can all men enter therein, since thou art yet unprepared for it thyself. Neither thy honesty, nor sobriety, nor all thy zeal for the religion of thy fathers, with thy great profession of all the external duties of it, can fit thee for the presence of God. If thou restest there, know that thy soul will remain in as thick darkness as that which surrounds a child yet unborn. For though thou enjoyest an animal life, as other creatures on earth, yet hast thou lost in Adam a spiritual life; the life of angels in thy soul; and thou must receive it again by a new and spiritual birth; or else thou shalt be as little capable of seeing and enjoying God as a child unborn is to see and enjoy the light of the sun."

3. Though this doctrine of the new birth surprises every natural man, and seems foolishness to him, our blessed Lord did not first deliver it: Moses had said two thousand years before him, "The Lord your God shall circumcise," or so change "your heart, that you shall be enabled to love him with all your soul. The Lord will take away your heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh." David had prayed, "Create in me a clean heart, and renew a right spirit within me." Ezekiel had cried aloud to all the people of God, "Cast away from you all your transgressions, and make yourselves new hearts and new spirits, for why will ye die, O house of Israel?" As if he had said, "In vain do you boast of being the house of Israel, and God's chosen people; unless you get new hearts and new spirits, you shall surely die."

4. These and many more passages of the Old Testament should make us think that no sincere Jew could be a stranger to the doctrine of the new birth. But as there are now many serious people who have a great form of religion, and notwithstanding know nothing of regeneration experimentally, supposing themselves to be of those just men who need no repentance, and consequently no spiritual change; so it was in the days of our Lord; and Nicodemus, with all his profession of religion, zeal, morality, and desire of being instructed, was one of the number.

5. Accordingly, struck with amazement at the saying of our Lord, and mistaking quite the meaning of his words, "How can a man be born (cried he) when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" Our Lord told him, if a man could enter into his mother's womb and be born again, that would not help him, for he would still be sinful flesh, and of the same corrupted nature as that from which he was born. But to enter into his kingdom, which is spiritual, he must be born of water and of the Holy Ghost, he must have a spiritual birth, be begotten of incorruptible seed, and become an adopted son of God.

6. Then, to prevent all doubts of the absolute necessity of submitting to this doctrine, as if it were not enough to have affirmed it necessary twice, and to have enforced it by the solemn word "indeed, indeed;" lest any one, like Nicodemus, should question the truth of it, because he never experienced it, our Saviour added, for the third time, (turning himself, no doubt, to all that were present,) "Ye must be born again.' As if he had said, "What I say to Nicodemus I say unto all, Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.""

7. Here the Jewish ruler, not daring to object any more to the truth of our Lord's doctrine, only expressed his wonder at hearing it. Our Lord, who (if we are sincere before him) always removes rather than punishes our stupidity in the things of God, would not discourage him; but with an admirable patience endeavoured to make him understand the impossibility of explaining by what operation of God's grace a man is born again.

8. How short, and yet how powerful was his argument! "When the wind bloweth," saith he, "thou canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit." As if he had said, "How can one describe the wind to him who has not felt or heard it? or how account whence it cometh? Yet we know and feel