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of them that are ready to perish, though prefumption and impenitence may prompt men to abuse it to bad purpofes. Diligence in business is converted by the covetous into an encouragement to eat the bread of carefulness; must we cease therefore to exhort men, by our Lord Jesus Christ, that with quietness they work, and eat their own bread. Take no thought for to-morrow founds like music in the ears of the fluggard, folding his hands to fleep; but must we, for this reafon, refrain from perfuading you to be careful for nothing, but, in every thing, by prayer and fupplication, to let your requests be made known unto God. Though the riches of the grace of God hath been wickedly perverted into an encouragement to fin, by those whose hearts are fully fet in them to do evil, their exhibition hath never failed to prove a powerful antidote against fin, to fuch as have tasted that the Lord is gracious; and, therefore, I decline not to treat of this reviving subject. Admire then the riches of forgiving mercy, and beware left you turn it into wantonness: it is dispensed that you may refemble the snow and the wool in purity; and this will be its certain effect, if you have experienced its happy influence.

19 If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land.

This verse defcribes the happy consequences of a prompt obedience to the directions contained in the preceding verses. The pofterity of Ifrael, like other people, were stiff-necked and rebellious, uncircumcised in heart and ears, and would not hearken to the voice of God, nor obey his commands. They were wife to do evil, but how to do that which is good they knew not. In order to their being willing and obedient, God must have wrought in them both to will and to do of his good pleasure, and made them his willing people in a day of his power, over

coming that perverse obstinacy for which they were remarkable, and difpofing them cheerfully to comply with the falutary advices which were given them. If, in confequence of this happy change of difpofition, they were willing to wash and be clean, to put away the evil of their doings, to cease to do evil, and learn to do well; if they were willing to abandon their wicked ways, to have recourse to the fovereign mercy of God for pardon of fin, to renounce their perverse obstinacy, and to be governed as his loyal fubjects by his righteous laws; then it should be well with them, and their children, and all the promises made to obedience should be their portion. Thefe, Christians, are effsential ingredients in the character of all the people of God; and you will do well ferioufly to confider, if they are defcriptive of your temper and practice. Are you heartily willing to accept of the generous offers made you, in the word of God, of the most valuable blessings, from a deep conviction of their tranfcendent excellence, and fuitableness to your condition? Are you obedient to your rightful Lord, viewing his fervice as your indispensable duty, your trueft wisdom, and highest interest; and do you study, in dependence on divine aid, to yield him that cheerful, unlimited obedience he gracioufly demands, and which is most justly his due? That you anfwer these simple, interesting inquiries in the affirmative, is indispensably necessary to your enjoying the bleffings contained in the following words:

Ye shall eat the good of the land. The land primarily intended in these words was the land of Canaan, the glory of all lands, which flowed with milk and honey, and abounded with corn and cattle, wine and oil, and the precious things of the earth, put forth by the fun and moon. This land the Almighty God promised for a poffeffion to the progenitors of this people, as an instance of his peculiar regard, and a type of a heavenly and better country, which he would bestow on the fpiritual pofterity of the father of the faithful. The

The good of that land comprehended all the good
things which the children of Ifrael therein enjoyed,
abundance of all the comforts of this life, multitudes
of flocks, large increase in things necessary to tempo-
ral profperity, deliverance from diseases, and the other
evils incident to the nations around them, and the
peaceable poffeffion of the sacred institutions of di-
vine worship wherewith they were favoured.
To eat this good, is to enjoy it, to feast upon it, so as
to be thereby agreeably supported and fatisfied. It is
not to poffefs the riches of the land as fome do, who
cannot enjoy them, and find little fatisfaction from
them; or as others, who have but small and few poffef-
fions, and therefore cannot be faid to have the riches
of the land. The expreffion imports, that they should
have large and valuable poffeffions, which they should
liberally ufe; that, under the care of divine providence,
opportunity should be afforded them of living on
the fruits of the land, from which they should reap the
most pleasing fatisfaction. Thefe good things were in-
tended to reprefent heavenly and better things, to
which they were directed to look forward as their
certain portion, did the character of willing and obe-
dient belong to them in the proper fenfe of the words.
Then should they be exalted to inherit the land of up-
rightness, and be fatisfied abundantly with the fatness
of God's house, and the rivers of his pleasures, which
are before his face, and at his right hand for ever-
more. Men and brethren, what a powerful motive
does this confideration suggest, to enforce your com-
pliance with the counsel of God, and your obedience
to his righteous authority! If you cordially comply
with the advices of the wonderful Counsellor, you
shall eat the good of the land, you shall receive every
temporal comfort which infinite wisdom fees proper
for you; with these you shall have his blessing, that
maketh rich, and addeth no forrow with it, whilst
they shall prove earnests and pledges of eternal blef-
fings. You shall enjoy the benefit of divine institu-

tions and difpenfations, both profperous and afflictive; and with these you shall be favoured with renewed communications of pardon and life, of righteousness and grace. Death itself shall operate for your advantage, by introducing you into that land in which you shall dwell for ever, and enjoy those things which eye hath not feen, ear hath not heard, neither heart conceived. May you be fo happy as feel the force of this argument, which is admirably calculated to excite you to obedience to God.

20 But if ye refuse and rebel, ye shall be devoured with the fword: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.

The extreme danger of rejecting the counsel of God is here reprefented. To refuse, in the sense here meant, is to reject with contempt what we will not grant to accept of, or fubmit to. The things fupposed, in this verse, to be thus refused, are, the wholesome admonitions contained in the 16th and following verses, which ought to have been gratefully received, and faithfully obeyed by God's ancient people, being most suitable to their circumstances, and conducive to their most important interests. To reject these must have been highly offensive to that God, who condefcended, after their manifold provocations, to point out the way of fafety; and most injurious to themselves, who, by this conduct, became exposed to more awful judgments. By acting in this manner, they rebelled against God, and declared they would not fubject themselves to the authority of their rightful Sovereign, and best Friend. Their refusal is here justly interpreted as rebellion, which consists in fubjects with-holding obedience to the laws enacted for their benefit, and taking up arms to overturn the kingdom or state. Thus the profeffing people of the Most High, rejecting his laws, and walking after the imagination of their own hearts, were guilty

of

of rebellion against their highest Lord. What obstinate wickedness is contained in this character! Is it not just and reafonable that they should have yielded fubjection and obedience to him who created them; who continually preserved them; who redeemed them from the most deplorable bondage, and required them to do nothing but what is holy, just, and good, and tending to advance their truest interests; who promifes the most valuable blessings to the willing and obedient, and threatens the most dreadful judgments against the rebellious. If it betrays the most sullen contempt in a child, to refuse to obey the lawful commands of his father; if it discovers the most perverse disposition in a people, to reject the mild and equitable authority of their prince; what language can express the guilt contracted by refusing to obey the wholesome admonitions of the Lord our God? Beware then of refusing to hearken to him who now speaks to you from heaven; 'For if they escaped not, who refused him ' that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, ' if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven *.

Ye shall be devoured with the sword. The fword, you all know, is a sharp weapon used in war, whereby the blood of multitudes hath been shed to the ground; and therefore when war is threatened in scripture, it is fometimes called the fword. At other times it denotes, all those calamities wherewith the nations are visited on account of their fins, whereby mankind are afflicted and destroyed. In this extensive sense the word feems to be used by Job, where he thus fpeaks:

Be ye afraid of the fword, for wrath bringeth the ' punishment of the sword+;' i, e. all manner of judgments. In the words before us it may be understood in either sense, as denoting the defolations of war, or all those calamities whereby God punishes men in this world for their fins, The Hebrew word,

* Heb. xii. 25.

† Job. xix. 29.

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which

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