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Fourthly, Let us confider the properties of this obedience which God requires of man.

Hence David

1. It is fincere obedience to his will. fays, I was upright before him, Pfal. xviii. 23. Hypocritical obedience may please men, but not God the Searcher of hearts. It was the commendation of the obedience of the Romans, that they obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered them, Rom. vi. 17. That facrifice that wants the heart, will never be accepted on God's altar. God weighs not the affections of his people to him by their actions, fo much as their actions by their affections, as in the cafe of Abraham's offering up Ifaac, Heb. xi. 17. in that of the Ifraelites offering to go into the promifed land, Numb. xiv. 40. compared with ver. 42. 44. which was an act of downright disobedience to the commandment of the Lord notified to them by Mofes, All obedience, without uprightness or fincerity, is a mere counterfeit, an empty pretence, which will be rejected with abhorrence.

2,

2. It must be conftant obedience. We must keep God's law continually, for ever and ever, as the pfalmut refolved to do, Pfal, cxix, 44. Man is ever doing fomething, yet he must always abide within the hedge of the law. Our obedience to God is all wrong when it comes only by fits, as heat in an ague, or is broke off like thote that go to fea for pleasure, who coine afhore when the ftorm rifes. God is unchangeable, and we must be conftant and fteady in obeying his will; at no time daring to act contrary to it,

3. It must be tender obedience. We must abstain from all appearance of evil, 1 Theff, v. 22, We inuft bate even the garment fped with the flesh, Jude 23. We must not rub on this hedge, nor come too near the borders of wickednefs, We have to do with a jealous God, whom whorish looks will offend, Ezek, vi. 9. We cannot be too nice in obedience. We muit not, in order to practice, examine whether it be a little or a great fin. All fuch diftinctions are highly

criminal, and inconfiftent with the difpofition of the perfon of a tender heart, who hates every fin of every kind, whether great or small, the wicked act as well as the wicked thought. A tender, a relenting heart, a heart afraid of fin, and cautious of the leaft wrong thought or act, is that which God requires, and the obedience refulting from it is the tender obedience here required.

4. It must be ready obedience, like that of those of whom the pfalmift fpeaks, As foon as they hear of me, they hall obey me, Pfal. xviii. 44. We muft do, and not delay; but be like the good David, who faid, I made hafte and delayed not to keep thy commandments, Pfal. cxix. 60. We are not to difpute, but obey; not to confer with flesh and blood, Gal. i. 16. It was Jonah's fin that he did not readily comply; and it was Abraham's commendation, that he did not difpute God's orders, but went not knowing whither he went, Heb. xi. 8. The leaft intimation of God's will, either as to doing or fuffering, muft be immediately and readily complied with, notwithstanding all difcouragements, and carnal reafonings. God's call and command muft drown the voice of carnal ease, and all arguments arifing from Spare thyself. Does God fay? we muft immediately go whither he directs us: does he fay, Come? we must inftantly obey the fummons, faying, Lord, We are here, ready to do what thou pleafeft to order or enjoin us. Without this readinefs and alacrity, all our obedience is ftark naught, a matter of mere force and compulfion; and therefore unacceptable to the great God, whom we are bound to ferve with a perfect heart and a willing mind.

5. It must be univerfal obedience, Pfal. cxix. 6. in having a refpect unto all God's commandments. The whole of the commands of God have the fame divine ftamp upon them. They are one golden chain: whofo takes away one link, breaks the chain; if the connection be destroyed, the whole machine falls afun der. Hear what the apoftle James fays on this head,

chap. ii. 10. 11. Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that faid, Do not commit adultery, Jaid alfo, Do not kill. Now, if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a tranfgreffor of the law. Obedience to one command will never fanctify difobedience to another. The contempt fhewn to one is a contempt of the one Lawgiver who appointed the whole. Hear what Chrift the glorious Legiflator of the church hath faid on this article, Whosoever shall break one of these leaft commandments, and hall teach men fo, he shall be called the leaft in the kingdom of heaven. Thus the tranfgreffing of one of the leaft of God's commandments, if any of them can juftly be called fuch, is a breach of the others, however great and important, and that becaufe the authority of God that gives fanction to the whole, is flighted and contemned. Whofo makes no confcience of any one known duty, discovers hypocrify in the reft.

6. It must be abfolute obedience, like that of Abraham, who, when called to go out unto a place which he was not acquainted with, went accordingly, not knowing whither he went, Heb. xi. 8. Subjects are obedient to magiftrates, people to paftors, wives to hufbands, children to parents, but abfolute obedience is due to none but God: for we are to call no man father upon earth, Matth. xxiii. 9. If their commands be contradicted by God's, they are not to be obeyed; bat though God's commands be contradicted by all the world, we muft obey them, as the difciples refufed to obey the commands of the Jewish council, in not preaching in the name of Jefus, because they claíhed with the orders of their exalted Mafier, Acts iv. 19. The most unreferved and unlimited obedience is due to the will and command of the great Lord of heaven and earth, and that without exception or referve, fay to the contrary who will.

7. Laftly, It must be perfect, though now in our fallen ftate we cannot give any obedience that do

ferves that epithet. God may and does require of all men in whatfoever ftate, Matth. v. ult. Be perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Though he accepts fincere obedience from those that are in Chrift, yet he requires of them perfect obedience, and every imperfection is their fin. Though he has not fufpended their juftification on their perfection, yet it is what they naturally owe to God, whofe law is perfect, and must have a perfect obedience performed to it, either by man himself or his furety. The believer, fenfible of his utter incapacity to perform fuch an obedience to the holy law of God, renounces all his own finful and imperfect, though fincere obedience, and betakes himself to the complete obedience of his Surety, and prefents it as his own to God, which he accepts.

In fhort, all true and acceptable obedience to the will of God flows from a right principle, that of faith and love in the heart. Faith is the hand that unites the foul to Chrift, and obedience to God is the fruit of that union. Love is the fpring and fource of it; for he that loveth Chrift, keepeth his commandments. And it must be directed to a right end, namely, the glory of God. We are not to obey God, in order to stop the mouth of a natural confcience, or gain applaufe among men, but to grow more like God, and bring more honour and glory to him.

Fifthly, Let us confider on what accounts do we owe this obedience to God. On thefe principally,

viz.

1. Because he is our great and glorious Creator, to whom we owe our life and being. He is our Lord, and we are his fubjects; he is our Mafter, and we are his fervants. And therefore it is juft and right that we fhould obey him, and conform to his will. He is every thing that speaks an authority to command us, and that can challenge an humility in us to obey. Man holds all of God, and therefore owes all the ope rations capable to be produced by thofe faculties, to

that fovereign power that endued him with them. Man had no being but from him, and he hath no motion without him: he fhould therefore have no being but for him, and no motion but according to his will. To call him Lord, and not to act in fubjection to him, is to mock and put an affront upon him. Hence it is faid, Why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do not the things that I fay? Luke vi. 46.

2. Because he is our chief end, the chief and laft end of all being. The Lord hath made all things for himself; and of him, and through him, and to him are all things. His glory fhould be the ultimate end of all our actions, and the mark to which they should all be directed. He gave being to all things, that they might fhew forth his praife. All the brute creatures, things animate and inanimate, do this in a paffive manner; but men and angels, who are rational agents, are bound to do this actively; and they are defigned by God for this very end and purpose.

3. Because he is the conferving caufe of all. As he gave man a being, fo he upholds and preferves him therein, by his mighty power. The prefervation of the creatures is as it were a continued creation; and in order to it there is necessary a continual exertion of divine power, and a conftant efflux of providential influence, without which they could not move and act at all. As therefore the life and motions of men depend entirely upon God as their upholder, fo that life and thofe motions fhould be employed for promoting his glory, and obeying his will.

4. Because of the eminency of his nature, which founds his fupreme dominion over us. God is the moft glorious and excellent of all beings, and the fource and fpring of all other beings whatfoever. He is poffeffed of all perfections in an infinite and tranfcendent manner. Whatever perfections, excellencies, and amiable qualities are fcattered among the creatures, they all unite in him in the utmoft perfection, and in him they fhine with the moft refplendent glo

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