to be delivered from the body of this death. To grow in grace is to grow in habitual repentance. 2. To grow in grace is to grow in faith. We are bound, fays the Apoftle, to thank God always for you bre thren, because that your faith groweth exceedingly. By adverting to the nature of faith, and what is predicated in the word of God concerning it, you will be able to see in what respects the faints may grow in faith, and how effential a part this conftitutes of the subject now before us. Saving faith is not merely the fimple act of the underftanding, which receives a report, and affents to its truth upon credible evidence, but it is a complex act, comprifing also the consent of the will, and conformable exercifes of the affections. It is not only a believing there is a Saviour, and even that we need his help, but it is an actual acceptance of him as he is offered in the Gospel; a receiving him for ourselves in all his glorious offices, as the Lord our righteousness. But what now are the effects of this faith? What does it produce? How does it work? We answer in few words :-By faith the foul becomes united to Chrift. He that is joined to the Lord is one fpirit. I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one. The Spirit of Chrift is the bond of this union upon his part, and faith lievers. Faith is that grace by which we are justified. Being juftified by faith." Not that we are acceptable to God upon account of the worthiness of our faith, but because only the fatisfaction and righteousness of Chrift is our righteousness before God, and we cannot receive and apply the fame any other way than by faith only." -Faith purifies the heart, and without works it is dead.It magnifies the Lord Jefus, Unto you who believe he is precious. It introduces the foul to folid peace and reft. upon the part of be We We which have believed do enter into reft.-Faith overcomes the world.-Faith leads to a patient waiting for the accomplishment of the promises. He that believeth, fball not make bafte. It directs to the throne of grace, and enables the faints to draw near with a true heart.It is a grace more precious than gold, and the believer must expect to have it tried. In a word, faith is the gift of God. It is the fubftance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not feen. It is that by which the believer lives. He walks by faith, and it will abide until it has performed its whole work, and is at last changed into vifion. I live, faid Paul, yet not I, but Chrift liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himfelf for me. From this general view, you may anticipate what is meant by growing in faith. It is to become more confirmed in the truth; and, from doubts and fears, to rife into a strong and filial confidence. It is to realize the union which is effected with Chrift, and more habitually to derive all needed supplies from him, as our living and covenant Head. We grow in faith, when it becomes more active, vigorous and productive of good works. When we are enabled in the spiritual warfare to take the fbield of faith, and therewith quench the fiery darts of the wicked. And when in the darkest seasons and the feverest trials, we learn to fay, Though he lay me, yet will I trust in him. Then we improve, when we are taught more cheerfully to submit to the yoke of Chrift; to look unto Jefus, and to esteem it our highest honour and happiness to deny ourselves, take up our cross daily and follow him. Lord, faid the difciples, increafe our faith. To grow in grace is to grow in faith, 3. To grow in grace is to improve in our love to God. To love God is to fet him always before us, as feeing him who is invifible; to meditate upon his glorious perfections, and feel a fervent outgoing of the heart towards him, as the first, the greatest, and the best of Beings, the treasure, the portion of the foul, our Father and our God. We grow in love when we increase in our defires to become holy as he is holy, and prefer his communion and fellowship above our chief joys. When having tafted that he is gracious, and experienced his love shed abroad upon our hearts, we are pained at his abfence, and anxious to draw near to him, and have him lift up the light of his countenance upon us. Then we grow in love, when we feel it becoming ftrong as death, and engaging us to live for him, whose we are and whom we ferve. When we can lose the creature, and yet find a fatisfying portion in God. And when we can truly fay, not only with respect to the earthly fanctuary, but to his courts in glory, My foul thirfteth for God, for the living God; when shall I come and appear before God! because thy loving kindness is better than life, my lips shall praife thee. Thus will I bless thee while I live. I will lift up my bands in thy name: My foul shall be fed as with marrow and fatness ; and my mouth fhall praise thee with joyful lips. To grow grace is to grow 4. To grow in grace is to advance in zeal for the glory of God. Innumerable motives prefs upon the mind to engage us to glorify him. Whether we live we are the Lord's, and whether we die we are the Lord's, whether we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord's. We are witnesses for God; a people formed for himself, that we should fhew forth his praife. When we understand these motives better, when we feel their influence more, and by thefe are urged to dedicate all we are and have to God, in in love to God. and and improve our influence upon others around us to do the fame, then we grow in zeal. We grow in zeal when we become more uniform in our obedience, more fingle in our views, and more fervently active in fhewing forth the praifes of him who bath called us out of darkness into bis marvellous light. The zeal of thine boufe, fays the Pfalmift, bath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me. Horror bath taken bold upon me, becaufe of the wicked that forfake thy law. Oh let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end! Ob that the falvation of Ifrael were come out of Zion! There is indeed frequently in young converts a zeal without knowledge; a boldness of spirit, unrestrained by prudence, and untaught by experience. Like Jehu, they are ready to fay,-Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord. The principle in part is right, although it is mixed with unhallowed paffions and tainted with pride. But a more extenfive acquaintance with the deceitfulness of their own hearts, and maturer attention to the nature and difficulties of the Chriftian life, is found foon to humble their forward fpirits, and lead them into the paths of fober and genuine zeal.-It is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing; and the Lord Jefus gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. It is proper to ferve God, not with a luke-warm foul, which offers the lame and the fick, but with our whole heart, with raised affections, and with fervency of spirit. To grow in grace is to grow in zeal. 5. To grow in grace is to become more heavenly inded. The Redeemer has brought life and immortality to light, and opened profpects to our view, which could only be obtained by a Divine revelation. He has raised his people, especially under the New Teftament difpen fation, fation, to exalted privileges, and made us to fit together in heavenly places in Chrift Jefus. To comprehend these privileges more clearly, to relish them higher, and have our conversation more and more as citizens of heaven, is to grow in heavenly mindedness.-When the temper and views of strangers and pilgrims prevail in us, and we find our affections more placed upon things above; when the work of heaven is more pleasant and habitual, our worfhip spiritual, and our praises affectionate, then we become more heavenly minded. To meditate upon the beavenly Jerufalem, the innumerable company of angels, and the general assembly of the church, and firft-born which are written in heaven; to feel an habitual defire of joining with them : As with a Seraph's voice to fing! to be weaned from this world; willing to stay, and yet defirous to depart and be with Chrift; this is to become more heavenly minded, and this is to grow in grace. 6. Finally, to grow in grace, is to be emptied of all dependence upon ourselves, and practically to conftitute the bleffed Jefus our all and in all. He must increase, but we muft decrease. We take him for our all when first we believe; but what that fully implies, we do not, when first we believe, yet understand. To grow in grace is the unfolding of that mystery. It is experimentally to know that Chrift is of God made unto us, fanctification: That in the Lord we have not only righteoufnefs, but in him also we have ftrength. It is to experience that when we are weak, then we are ftrong, and when we grow downward in humility, patience and refignation, then we most effectually |