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portant station does he occupy! What an understanding must he poffess, to be accurately acquainted with the diversified circumstances and necessities of all the redeemed! How unparalleled is that love, which knows no variableness, which renders him not only in his lowest abasement, but in his highest dignity, the friend of sinners; and which induces him, while surrounded by all the adorations of heaven, to listen to the complaints and petitions of each of his people upon earth; and never suffers him for one moment to remit the kindness of his attentions!

Again, what a representation does the subject give us of the happiness of believers! Though their Saviour be "passed into the heavens," they know that he has not dropped his concern for them; they know that they "have not an High Priest, who cannot be "touched with the feeling of their infirmities." What is the inference? "Let us therefore come boldly to "the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and "find grace to help in time of need." "Having such 66 an High Priest over the house of God, let us draw 66 near in full affurance of faith." Let us contemplate our glorious Interceffor. Let us remember the dignity of his nature; he "is the brightness of the "Father's glory, and the exprefs image of his per"son." Let us remember the dearness of his character; "This," fays the Father, is my beloved Son "in whom I am well pleafed." "Afk of me, and I "shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and "the uttermoft parts of the earth for thy poffeffion." Let us remember the value of his atonement; he is more than an intercessor, he is "an advocate with the

"Father;" "he is the propitiation for our fins." He could fay, "I have glorified thee on the earth; I have "finifhed the work which thou haft given me to do; and now, Father, glorify me." "He entered heaven with «his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption "for us." His fufferings and death, his obedience and righteoufnefs, all plead our caufe; he afks nothing which God had not fuspended on a condition which he had already performed. And in consequence of all this, let us remember the certainty of his success; "I know that thou hearest me always." Come then, christians, and "rejoice with joy unspeakable and full "of glory." You have a Friend in court; an elder Brother in the palace of the King of Kings. In his all-prevailing name you may approach; and while blushing over your poor services, you may be assured that your prayers will be heard, that your strength shall be equal to your day, that your grace shall be crowned with glory, and that "no good thing shall be "withholden from you." While Zechariah was burning incense within, all the people were praying withO pleasing emblem of christians, and of "the High Priest of their profession!" While you are praying in the outer court of this world, he is "with"in the vail" with the censer, and "the blood of "sprinkling!" It was the happiness of the Israelites while fighting in the plain below, to look up and see Moses pleading with God for them on the hill; be not "Who shall lay any dismayed, ye seed of Jacob. thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth: who is he that condemneth? It is Christ "that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even

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"at the right hand of God, who also maketh inter"ceffion for us. Nay, in all these these things we are

more than conquerors through him that loved us. "For I am perfuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor "angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, "nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us "from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our "Lord."

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SERMON XIII.

CONCUPISCENCE PUNISHED.

NUMBERS XI. 31, 34.

And there went forth a wind from the Lord, and brought quails from the sea, and let them fall by the camp, as it were a day's journey on this side, and as it were a day's journey on the other side, round about the camp, and as it were two cubits high upon the face of the earth. And the people stood up all that day, and all that night, and all the next day, and they gathered the quails: he that gathered least gathered ten homers; and they spread them all abroad for themselves, round about the camp. And while the flesh was yet between their teeth, ere it was chewed, the wrath of the Lord was kindled against the people; and the Lord smote the people with a very great plague. And he called the name of that place Kibroth-hattaavaḥ: because there they buried the people that lusted.

IT is one design of the sacred Scriptures to make "sin appear exceeding sinful." Sometimes they place the evil before us in its essential deformity and vileness. At other times they surround it with "the terrors of the Almighty," drawn from those

dreadful threatenings which juftify all our fears. To confirm these declarations, and illustrate these motives, we have also given us numerous examples in which we see the malignity of sin realized.. "Let no man 66 say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for "God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth "he any man; but every man is tempted when he is "drawn away of his lust and enticed, Then when "lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin "when it is finished, bringeth forth death.”

The event which is to engage our present attention is singularly awful. We do not wonder that God who esteems the prayer of the wicked an abomination, should refuse their unreasonable cry; but when we see him working a miracle to gratify their wishes, and making his bounty the means of their destruction, we are compelled to exclaim, "how unsearchable are his "judgements, and his ways are past finding out!"

The Israelites had been for some time preternaturally fed with manna. At length they despise it, and influenced by the multitude of strangers that was among them, fall a lusting. They wept again and said, "Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the "fish which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cucumbers "and the melons, the leeks, and the onions, and the "garlick: but now our soul is dried away: there is "nothing at all besides this manna before our eyes. The Lord hearkened and heard. He promised to indulge them and behold the dreadful accomplishment of his word. "And there went forth a wind from "the Lord, and brought quails from the sea, and let "them fall by the camp, as it were a day's journey

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