meekness, and hatred of sin; let us, especially, by our secret, and frequent, and fervent prayer, seek the salvation of our beloved relatives. "For what knowest thou, O wife, whether thou shalt save thy husband; or how knowest thou, O man, whether thou shalt save thy wife?"

SERMON XII.

EPHESIANS V. 25-27.—“ Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word; that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy, and without blemish."

THE ends of Christ's mediation are, to reconcile God to sinners, and sinners to God, by his atoning blood; and to restore to the reconciled the image of their Maker, lost by the fall. Christ is not more earnest in inculcating faith in the first on sinners, than in inculcating compliance with the last on believers. He purchased the first at the dearest price, and he exhibits himself as the living pattern of the last in human nature. Rom. viii. 29. In this passage, by his inspired ambassador, he enjoins husbands to love their wives, and presents his own love to his people as their consummate model. "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word; that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy, and without blemish."

In attempting to illustrate the example of Christ, I consider, 1st, The love of Christ to his church; and, 2d, The effectual exertions of his love for the object of it. And, if ever we have felt the value of Christ's promise, to the right understanding and due impression of divine truth on our hearts, on this subject, we will earnestly plead the fulfilment of it: Lord, may thy Holy Spirit take of the things pertaining to thee, and show them to us in their reality, nearness, and heart-affecting beauty!

I. Under the first head, the person who lovesChrist; the object of his affection-the Church; and the nature of his peculiar love for her, demand our attention in their order.

1st, The person who loves is Christ. We should always, in speaking of him, remember, with holy awe, that, in his divine nature, he is the Son of God, and one with the Father. Without this deep sense of his infinite glory and excellence, his doings and sufferings in our nature are not considered or treated with the respect due to their incalculable value. Christ, the Son of God, is mediator between God and man, and the surety of the sinners committed to him by the Father; and, consequently, he is the servant of the Father, in whom his soul delighteth; and, in the fulness of time, he took on himself a true body and a reasonable soul, prepared for him by the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and was born of her, yet without sin:

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thus, he is God and man" in two distinct natures, and one person, for ever." In the text he is called Christ, to remind us that he is appointed by the Father to his office, and anointed with the Spirit above measure as to his human nature, to enable him to fulfil the duties of the Redeemer, and accomplish the salvation of all those for whom he became surety, by pouring on them his gracious influences. This is the glorious, and wonderful, and gracious person who loves; and,

2d, The church is the highly favoured object of his love. The object of Christ's love is not the whole world, or every individual in the world, for multitudes never were of the church formed on earth; it is not the visible church, by whatever name called, for even in it "all men have not faith." It is the assembly of true believers throughout the world, and in all ages of the world; and hence, and because the most valuable part of it, they are in Scripture called the world, and the whole world, on whom alone the love of Christ is permanently fixed. Here we must remember that Christ first loved them, not as believers, but as sinners, scattered throughout the world, to be called into the church, through faith in him, according to the terms of the covenant of grace between the Father and himself. Hence, Christ is styled, "the head of his body, the church." As Adam was the head and representative of all his natural posterity in the first, so Christ is the head and representative of all

his spiritual posterity, even of all whom, of his own will, he shall beget by the word, of all who shall believe in his name in the second covenant; and, in a higher sense, he is the head of authority, and spiritual life and influence "to his body, the church." Though the members of the invisible church were united to Christ in the eternal purpose of God, this makes no actual change in their condition, till the time then fixed has arrived for putting forth divine power to separate them from the world lying in wickedness, and unite them to Christ, by faith of the operation of the Spirit, given on behalf of Christ; for before that time they remain under the curse of the first covenant, and the penalty of the broken law, being "children of wrath, even as others," and "the wrath of God abiding on them." Ah! what objects for the love of Christ were these! Conceived in sin, and brought forth in iniquity-without original righteousness, and corrupt in their whole nature-rebels against God, and captives of Satan-part of the punishment of their apostasy, cast out of their Father's house and inheritance, and under his wrath and cursehateful, and hating one another-groaning under sin and misery, and without help or desire of deliverance! And yet, these sinful, miserable, and helpless creatures were the objects of Christ's love, -the highest, the holiest, and most fervent love! and,

3dly, What manner of love was this? Such a love as can exist in God alone; such a love as never