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THE

NECESSITY OF REGENERATION.

Jesus answered, and said unto him, verily, verily I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.-JOHN iii. 3.

Jesus answered, verily, verily I say unto thee, except a man be born of water, and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.-JOHN iii. 5.

THESE Words contain the foundation of all practical religion here, and happiness hereafter. It is the principal doctrine Christ, as a prophet, came to teach; and as a king, to work in the heart.

The text proves the indispensable necessity of regeneration, by which I mean not a relative, but a real change of the subject, wrought in the complexion and inclinations of the soul. As in the restoring of health, there is a change made in the temper and humours of the body.

As mankind were changed in Adam, from what they were in a state of creation; so men must be changed in Christ, from what they were in a state of corruption. As that change was not only relative, but real, and the relative first introduced by the real; so must this. The relation of a child of wrath, was founded upon the sin committed. Without a real change, there can be no relative. Being in Christ, as freed from condemnation, is always attended with a walking in the spirit; and walking is not before living. For the better understanding this point, I

shall lay down some propositions concerning the Necessity of Regeneration.

There are but two states, one saving, the other damning; a state of sin, and a state of righteousness. All men are divided into two ranks. In regard of their principle, some are in the flesh, some in the spirit. In regard of their obedience, some walk after the flesh, some after the spirit. Some are slaves to the flesh, others are led by the Spirit: some live only to self, some live to God. In regard of the exercise of their minds, their nobler faculty; some mind the things of the flesh, others the things of the Spirit. Some indulge themselves in sin, others place the delights of their spirits upon better and higher objects.

The scripture mentions no other. A state of emnity, wherein men have their inclinations contrary to God. A state of friendship and fellowship, wherein men walk before God unto all well-pleasing, and would not willingly have an inward motion swerve from his will. One is called light, the other darkness; you were sometimes darkness, but now ye are light: one, the children of wrath, the other, children of God. There is no medium between them: every man is in one or the other of these states. All believers, from the bruised reed, to the tallest cedar; from the smoking flax on earth, to the flaming lamp in heaven; from Thomas, that would not believe without seeing, to Abraham, who would believe without staggering, all are in a state of life. And all from the most beautiful moralist, to the most venemous toad in nature's field; from the young man in the gospel, who was not far from the kingdom of heaven, to Judas, who was in the very bottom of hell; all are in a state of death. Mere nature, though never so curiously garnished, can place a man no higher. Faith, though with many infirmities, puts us in a state of amity: unbelief, though with many

moralities, continues us in a state of enmity. These two very opposite conditions mentioned, include all the human race. The highest endowments of men in a state of nature cannot please God. The delight of God then, supposeth some real change in the object, which is the ground of that delight: for God is wise in his delight, and could not be pleased with any thing which was not fit for his complacency. Since original nature in a man, cannot displease God, unless it be changed by some fault, because it was his own work; so our present nature cannot please God, unless it be changed by some grace, though it be otherwise never so highly dignified. Whatsoever grows up from the old Adam, is the fruit of the flesh: whatsoever grows up by the new Adam, in us, is the offspring of the Spirit; and upon these two stocks, all men in the world are set. Since therefore one is utterly destructive, and cannot please God, though never so well garnished, (for being utterly contrary to him, it cannot be approved by him) the other is absolutely necessary to salvation.

It is necessary upon the account of the fall of man, and the consequences of it. In Adam we died, "As in Adam all died:" therefore in Adam we sinned. 1 Cor. xv. 22. "By one man's disobedience, many were made sinners." Rom. v. 19. Man cannot be supposed to sin in Adam, unless some covenant had intervened between God and Adam, whence there did arise in the whole human nature a debt, of having righteousness transfused from the first parent to all his posterity: the want of this grace, wherein his posterity are conceived, is a privation, and a crime which was voluntary in the root and head. This privation of righteousness must be removed. The institution of God stands firm, that Adam, and his posterity should have a pure righteousness. It is not for the honour of God to enjoin it so strictly at first,

and to have no regard to it afterwards. Now this privation of righteousness, and the unrighteousness which hath taken place in the sons of Adam, cannot be removed without the infusion of grace. For without this grace, he would always want righteousness, and yet be always under an obligation to have it: he would be desirous of happiness; but without it, and under an impossibility of attaining it. Were the soul of man indifferent to good and evil, the writing of moral precepts upon it, by good education, would sway it to walk in the paths of virtue: but it is not so; for take two, let them have the same ways of education, the same precepts instilled into them, as Esau and Jacob had by their father, who were equally taught; yet how different were their lives? Esau's bad, Jacob's not without flaws. Education had not the power to root corruption out of either; no, nor out of any man in the world, without a higher principle. There is some powerful principle in the soul, which leads it into by-paths, contrary to those wholesome rules instilled into it. Hence ariseth a necessity of some other principle to be put into the heart, to overrule this corrupt bias. Man goes astray from the womb, as it is in Psal. lviii. 3. "The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they be born." There must be something to rectify him, and expel this wandering humour. Also,

By the fall of man there was contracted an unfitness to any thing that is good. Man is so immersed in wrong notions of things, that he cannot judge fully of what is good, "to every good work reprobate." Tit. i. 16.. The state of nature, or the old man, is described, "to be corrupt, according to deceitful lusts." Eph. iv. 22. Deceitful, seducing from God, drawing us into perdition, by representing evil under the notion of good; which evidenceth our understandings to be unfit to judge without a new illumi

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