The Miftake of relying upon external Per- ; formances confidered.

SERMON

ROMANS x. 13.

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For whofoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord fhall be faved.

HAVE frequently obferved to SER M.
you that when Men are refol-
ved to retain their Sins, and

:

go

on in their evil Practices; and yet not to caft away all Hopes of future Happiness; they are ready to lay hold on any obfcure, or mistaken, Text of the New Teftament and to draw it to their own Purpose, without confidering the Purpose of the Writer, or laying the whole Tenour of the Gospel together. One of this fort of Paffages, relating to Faith, I confidered in my laft Difcourfe; and endeavoured to fhew

X.

SERM. that no Encouragement could be defigned X. in it for any to rely on a bare Belief of the Gofpel, without the bringing forth those good Fruits, and practifing thofe Moral Duties, which the Gofpel it felf recommends.

ANOTHER of the like fort, is That which I have now read to you; which fome Men of weak Understandings, or strong Pasffons, may be apt to feparate from the reft of this Epiftle, and confider it fo much by it felf, as to imagine that it was the Apostle's Design in it to make the Calling upon the Name of God, or of our Lord Jefus Chrift, the whole of the Gospel-Covenant; and to affix Salvation to the mere outward joining in the public Acts of Chriftian Profeffion, and Worship. This is a very great Error: and must prove at last a very fatal Mistake. And tho' it be indeed fuch a Mistake as one would think no one who confiders the Nature of God, or all his Declarations in the Gofpel, could permit himself to be guilty of; yet we find by Experience that many profeffed Chriftians do at leaft feek for Eafe this way; and find as much as any fuch poor Pretence can give to the Confcience of such a Creature as Man is.

Ir cannot therefore be accounted unne- SERM, ceffary or improper, to confider the Cafe of X. fuch profeffed Chriftians as allow themselves in the Commiffion of known Sins: and yet receive Comfort, and entertain Hopes of future Happiness, from their devout, and repeated Performance of fome outward Acts of Chriftian Profeffion, and Worship. They know that they continue in the Practice of Sin. But because they feel a Warmth of what they imagine to be Devotion in the Worship of God; because they frequent the public Prayers, or Sacrament of the Lord's Supper; because they hear his Word with fome Attention and Zeal; upon fuch Accounts as thefe, they hope for his Favour at laft, and perceive fome Satisfaction and Reft in that Hope for the prefent: imagining, perhaps, that St. Paul is on their fide, and hath given it as his Judgment, that whosoever should call upon the Name of the Lord, as they do, fhould be faved.

ONLY, before I come to fpeak particularly to the Cafe of fuch Chriftians, I must give you a true Account of St. Paul's Defign in this part of this Epiftle; which will at the fame time lead you to the true meaning

SERM. of the Words of the Text: viz. that He is

here difputing against Two Errors of thè Jews. The one is, their feeking Justification by the Law of Mofes; and rejecting the Faith of Jefus Chrift, and the Gospel preached to them as the only Method of Justification and the other is, their imagining that the Meffiah, whom they had been taught to expect, was to be of Benefit only to themfelves; and that the Gentiles were to have no part in his Bleffings. These two Errors, you may fee, gave St. Paul no occafion of speaking particularly in this place of the Neceffity which profeffed Chriftians lay under, to practise all Virtue; or any otherwife than in general Terms, of the Chriftian Faith, in Oppofition to these Mistakes. It was enough for his Purpofe to put them in mind that, according to the Law it felf, they muft feek for Juftification in another Method, distinct from that of the Works of the Law of Mofes; that this Juftification had been de clared by their own Prophets to be of fuch a nature, as that it must be effected by means of Faith; and that the fame Prophets had enlarged the Bounds of the Kingdom of the Meffiah, and had promifed this Bleffing to

all

all true Believers wherefoever difperfed thro' s E R M. the World.

THE first of thefe He doth, ver. 4. For Christ is the End of the Law; that is, the Law it felf leads to Juftification by the Gofpel because, as it follows, ver. 5. Mofes himself proposeth Justification by the Law upon no other Terms, but that of a perfect fulfilling the whole Law in every Tittle, Now, none of you can pretend to this: and therefore you ought to be willingly led to feek for Juftification, or Acquittance from your paft Sins and Failings, by believing and embracing the Gospel.

As to the second; He puts them in mind, ver. 11. that Ifaiaḥ himself, one of their own Prophets, fpeaking of the Messiah, had declared long ago, that the true Method of obtaining the Affurance of God's Favour was by believing in Him, when He should appear; and by entering into his Religion. And then He argues, from the Latitude of this Declaration, that whosoever, whether Jew or Greek, takes this Method, fhall be faved; alledging another of their Prophets, who had likewife, in fpeaking of the Kingdom of the Meffiah, declared that whofoever, without any ExP 3 ception

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