Outline 27.

Is he a sovereign remedy? - Convinced sinners, despair not; neglect it not; spoil it not; use it in haste, now. To avoid death, to secure life, to get strength to go through the wilderness to Canaan.

3. Backsliders, look again. - Let there be enmity, &c.

4. Believers, look on till you have got to Canaan. Serpents follow you; but so does the Rock. Help others; tell of the Physician. Show you are healed; work, and eat.

OUTLINE 27.

“For whom [Jesus Christ my Lord] I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung that I may win Christ,” Philippians 3:8. INTRODUCTION. - “Win Christ.” What a prize!

Kings have run in this race: beggars not excluded. It is for all that “run lawfully.”

I. Let us take a view of the prize.

Riches, honours, pleasure, earth, heaven, life, eternal life, men, angels, God in three persons, Christ in three offices.

II. The way to gain it.

Faith. It is the ticket that always brings the glorious prize. If a distracted murderer, dying thief, &c.

III. What loss we are called to suffer.

“All things.” - Loss of carnal rest, fair reputation, prospects of fortune, (Balaam,) friends, sensual pleasures, life itself; all this is lost in appearance; found in reality.

IV. This loss is small.

It is but the loss of dung, something base, disagreeable to the sight and smell, fit to be cast out, and buried out of the way.

APPLICATION. - Ungodly. - You too will soon suffer “the loss of all things;” but for a worse cause than Christ’s. You will lose all good things on earth; get all evil things in hell. O view Christ’s excellency and the dung of the earth.

Mourners. - Look to Christ and be saved. Win a gracious Christ now, and you will have a glorious one soon. Run, lay aside every weight, despondency, gloom, hard thoughts of Christ and his blood. Put in a blank, a blot, and you will have a prize.

Backsliders. - O, what have you left? The pursuit of Christ. What do you grasp? Dung.

Weak believers. - Be strong, Christ is all. O hold him fast. He hath apprehended you.

Believers. - Grow stronger.

OUTLINE 28.

“Unto us was the Gospel preached as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it,” Hebrews 4:2.

I. The everlasting Gospel was preached to the Jews.

1. In the promises. - The woman’s seed, the seed of Abraham, Shiloh, Messiah, the prophet like unto Moses.

2. Types. - Noah, Aaron, Joshua, brazen serpent, purification, sacrifices, as the daily lamb, the paschal lamb, the scape goat, offers of free mercy. This and the promise are chiefly meant here.

II. “The Gospel is preached to us.”

In the promises, types, antitypes, sacraments, daily offers of mercy and pardon.

III. “The word preached did not profit them.”

They remained,

(1.) unconvinced,

(2.) unholy,

(3.) unhappy,

(4.) unfit for glory.