A history of the work of redemption. Containing the outlines of a body of…

I COME now to the fifth period of the times of the Old Testament, beginning with David, and extending to the Babylonish captivity; and would now proceed to show how the work of redemption was carried on through this period also.—And here,

I. The first thing to be taken notice of, is God's anointing that person that was to be the ancestor of Christ, to be king over his people. The dispensations of Providence that have been taken notice of through the last period, from Moses to this time, respect the people whence Christ was to proceed. But now the scripture• ⟨p. 74⟩history leads us to consider God's providence towards that particular ••rson whence Christ was to proceed, viz. David. It pleased God […] this time remarkably to select out that person of whom Christ was to come, from all the thousands of Israel, and to put a most honourable mark of distinction upon him, by anointing him to be king over his people. It was only God that could find him out. His father's house is spoken of as being little in Israel, and he was the youngest of all the sons of his father, and was least expected to be the man that God had chosen▪ by Samuel. God had before, in the former ages of the world, remarkably distinguished the persons from whom Christ was to come; as he did Seth, and Noah, and Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. But the last we have any account of God's marking out in any notable manner, the very person of whom Christ was to come, was in Jacob's blessing his son Judah; unless we reckon Nahshon's advancement in the wilderness to be the […] of the tribe of Judah. But this distinction of the person of whom Christ was to come, in David, was very honourable; for it was God's anointing him to be king over his people. There was something further denoted by David's anointing, than was in the anointing of Saul. God anointed Saul to be king personally; but God intended something further by sending Samuel to anoint David, viz. to establish the crown of Israel in him and in his family, as long as Israel continued to be a kingdom; and not only so, but what was infinitely more still, establishing the crown of his universal church, his spiritual Israel, in his seed, to the end of the world, and throughout all eternity.