A continuation of the exposition of the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the…

Obs. The stability of the New Covenant depends on the Suretyship of Christ and is secured unto Believers thereby. The Introduction of a Surety in any case is to give Stability and Security. For it is never done but on a supposition of some weakness, or defect on one Account or other. If in any Contract, Bargain, or Agreement, a man be esteemed every way responsible both for Ability and Fidelity, there is no need of a Surety, nor is it required. But yet whereas there is a defect or weakness amongst all men, mentioned by our Apostle in the next verses, namely, that they are all mortal and subject unto death, in which case neither Ability nor Fidelity will avail any thing; men in all cases of Importance need Sureties. These give the utmost confirmation that affairs among men are capable of. So doth the Suretyship of Christ on our behalf in this Covenant. For the evidencing whereof, we may consider,

Obs. The stability of the New Covenant depends on the Suretiship of Christ and is secured unto Believers thereby. The Introduction of a Surety in any case is to give Stability and Security. For it is never done but on a supposition of some weakness, or defect on one Account or other. If in any Contract, Bargain, or Agreement, a man be esteemed every way responsible both for Ability and Fidelity, there is no need of a Surety, nor is it required. But yet whereas there is a defect or weakness amongst all men, mentioned by our Apostle in the next verses, namely, that they are all mortal and subject unto death, in which case neither Ability nor Fidelity will avail any thing; men in all cases of Importance need Sureties. These give the utmost confirmation that affairs among men are capable of. So doth the Suretiship of Christ on our behalf in this Covenant. For the evidencing whereof, we may consider,

1. The first Covenant as made with Adam, had no Surety. As unto that which in the New Covenant the Suretyship of Christ doth principally respect, it had no need of any. For there was no sin, Transgression or Rebellion against God to be satisfied for, so that it was absolutely incapable of a Surety unto that end. But as to the second part of it, or his undertaking for us, that through supplies of strength from him, we shall abide faithful in the Covenant, according to the Terms and Tenure of it; this had no inconsistency with that first state. As the Lord Christ upon his undertaking the work of Mediation, became an immediate Head unto the Angels that sinned not, whereby they received their establishment and security from any future defection; so might he have been such an Head unto, and such an undertaker for man in Innocency. No created nature was or could have been unchangeable in its condition and state, merely on its root of Creation. As some of the Angels fell at first, forsaking their habitation, falling from the principle of obedience which had no other Root but in themselves; so the Rest of them, all of them, might afterwards have in like manner Apostatized and fallen from their own innate stability, had they not been gathered up into the new head of the Creation, the Son of God as Mediator; receiving a New Relation from thence, and establishment thereby. So it might have been with man in Innocency: But God in his infinite Sovereign wisdom saw it not meet that so it should be. Man shall be left to the Exercise of that Ability of living unto God, which