A second volume of discourses or sermons on several scriptures

¹Ninthly, Consider this, God pardons not only, though he saw no Merit in us, but what is more to the Glory of his free Grace, though he foresaw many future ⟨p. 39⟩wrongs and injuries would be added to those we had already done. He foresaw all our Provocations and Rebellions, how we would abuse his Grace, and turn it into wantonness. He saw the Rebellions of our unregeneracy, the Infirmities of our Converted State; yet tho' he foresaw all before they were, yet he resolved not to see them when they are, Numb. 23.21. He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, nor perverseness in Israel. And this, though it ought not to encourage us in sin: yet it may be a support and comfort to us, when through weakness and infirmity we have sinned; that God who loved us, and decreed to pardon us, when he foresaw how sinful we would be, will not certainly now cease to love us, and pardon us, when we are as vile and sinful as he foresaw we would be.

1. 1God pardons sin, though he foresees we will commit more sin.

Tenthly, The Lord Jesus Christ, ¹by whom alone we are pardoned, is freely given to us by the Father. What price could we have offered, to have brought down the Son of his Eternal Love from his Embraces. What was there in us to draw a Saviour out of Heaven? Were ⟨p. 40⟩we so amiable as to move him to divest himself of his Glory, and to Eclipse his Deity in our Mortal Bodies, only that he might become like such poor Worms as we are, and take us unto himself? Ask no more, but admire, God so loved the World, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him might not perish, but have everlasting Life. Here's a Mystery that the whole College of Angels can never comprehend! What, God Condemn his Son, that he might pardon Rebels! The Son of God blot his Deity in our Flesh, only that he might blot out our Transgressions with his Blood! This is such transcendent free Grace and Love, that in this we have an Advantage above the Angels themselves, standing higher in the Favour of God, upon this account, than they do.