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Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, yê everlasting doors, and the King of glory shall come in. And in another Pfalm, penned on the fame occafion, and exprefsly faid to have been delivered on that very day into the hand of Afaph, 1 Chron. xvi. 1, 7. is that expreffion found, ver. 11. Seek his facé continually; justly to be interpreted, agreeable to the circumstances of the main thing which David through the Spirit had in view that day, namely, the coming of the Meffias. Thus, Chrift bears the name of his fpiritual feed; and they, on the other hand, bear his name too: 1 Cor. xii. 12. For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: fo alfo is Chrift.

4. The promises were made to Chrift as the fecond Adam, the head and reprefentative of his feed: Gal. iii. 6. Now to Abraham and his feed were the promifes made. He faith not, And to feeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy feed, which is Chrift. I own, that here, even as in the text immediately before cited, is meant, Chrift myftical, the head and members. It is to them that the promifes are here faid to be made; but primarily to the head, fecondarily to the members in him; even as the promise of life in the firft covenant, was primarily made to Adam as the head, and fecondarily to all his natural feed in him. Thus, in the typical covenant with Abraham, the promises of the earthly inheritance were primarily made to Abraham himfelf, and fecondarily to his feed according to the flesh. And even fo the promise of the eternal inheritance plainly stands made to Christ, Tit. i. 2. In hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lye, promifed before the world began; when there was none but Chrift to whom that promise could be made perfonally. Accordingly the covenant is faid to be nade with the houfe of Ifrael, namely, the fpiritual

Ifrael;

Ifrael; yet are the promises of it directed, not to them, but to another perfon, Heb. viii. 10. I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people. The reafon of which plainly appears, in the pro mifes being made to Chrift as their head and reprefentative. Now, forafmuch as thefe promises belong to the covenant of grace, which is therefore called the covenants of promife, Eph. ii. 12. it is manifeft, that if they were made to Chrift as the head and reprefentative of a feed, the covenant of grace was made with him as fuch; and he to whom they were primarily made, was furely the party-contractor therein.

5. Lastly, This federal headship of Chrift, and his reprefenting his spiritual feed in the covenant of grace appears from his furetifhip in that covenant, the better teftament whereof Jefus was made a furety, Heb. vii. 22. Now, he became furety for them in the way of fatisfaction for their debt of punishment and obedience; and that taking the whole burden on himself, as for perfons utterly unable to anfwer for themfelves. This will afterwards fall in to be cleared. Mean while, fuch a furety is a true representative of the party he is furety for, and one perfon with them in the eye of the law. Hence, not only is Chrift faid to have been made fin for us, 2 Cor. v. 21. to have had the iniquity of us all taid on him, Ifa. liii. 6. and to have died for us, Rom. v. 8.: but alfo we are said to have been crucified with Christ, Gal. ii. 20. to be made the righteousness of God in him, 2 Cor. v. 21. yea, to be raised up together, and glorified, being made to fit together in heavenly places in Chrift Jefus, Eph. ii. 6. and to be made alive in Chrift, as we die in Adam, 1 Cor. xv. 22. All which neceffarily requires this his headship and reprefentation in the covenant.

And thus it appears, that the fecond cove nant was made with Chrift as the laft or fecond

Adam,

Adam, head and representative of his fpiritual feed.

Secondly, We are to enquire, wherefore the fecond covenant, the covenant of grace, was fo made? And this fhall be accounted for in the following particulars.

1. The covenant of grace was made with Christ as the last Adam, head and representative of his fpiritual feed, that infinite love might have an early vent, even from eternity. The fpecial love of God to the spiritual feed took vent in the covenant of grace. And that love and that covenant are of the fame eternal date: as the love was everlasting or eternal, Jer. xxxi. 3. fo was the covenant, Heb. xiii. 20. Tit. i. 2. But fince the feed are but of yefterday, the covenant of grace behoved to be like the covenant of works, a yesterday's covenant, a timecovenant, if it was not made with Chrift as their representative; it could not otherwife have been an eternal covenant. The promife of eternal life, which is undoubtedly a promise of the covenant of grace, could not otherwife have been of fo ancient a date, as before the world began, as the apoftle fays it is, Tit. i. 2. How could an eternal covenant be originally made with creatures of time, but in their eternal head and reprefentative? Or how could an eternal covenant be perfonally made with them, by way of perfonal application to them, had it not been from eternity made with another as their head and reprefentative? But in this method of infinite wifdom, free love took an early vent; not waiting the flow motion of its objects creeping out of the womb of time, in which many of them lie wrapt up, even to this day. But as princes fometimes do, by proxy, marry young princeffes, before they are marriageable, or capable to give their confent; fo God, in his infinite love, married to himfelf all the fpiritual feed, in and by Jefus Chrift as their reprefentative, not only before they were capable of confenting, but be

fore

fore they were at all. The which they do afterwards, in their effectual, calling, approve of by faith, and give their confent perfonally to; and fo they enjoy God as their God, and God hath them as his people: John xx. 17. I afcend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God.

2. Otherwise it could not have been made at all a conditional covenant answering the defign of it. This covenant taking place only upon the breach of the first covenant, the great defign of it was, that dead finners might have life, as was before observed. Now, in order to this, a holy just God stood upon conditions, without performing of which that life was not to be given and they were high conditions, Pfal. xl. 6. Sacrifice and offering thou didst not defire. 1 Theff. v. 9, 10. Jefus Chrift who died for us, that we should live. But how could an effectual conditional covenant for life be made with dead finners, otherwife than in a reprefentative? Dead fouls cannot perform any condition for life at all which can be pleafing to God. They must needs have life before they can do any thing of that nature, be it never so small a condition: therefore a conditional covenant for life could not be made with finners in their own perfons: efpecially confidering, that the conditions for life, were fo high, that man at his best state was not able to perform them. Wherefore, if fuch a covenant was made at all, it behoved to be made with Chrift as their reprefentative, Rom. viii. 3, 4.

3. It was fo ordered, to the end it might be unto us poor finners a covenant of grace indeed. It is evident from the holy feriptures, that this covenant was defigned for exalting the free grace of God; and that it is fo framed, as to be a covenant of pure grace, and not of works, in refpect of us, whatever it was in refpect of Chrift: Rom. iv. 16. Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace.

Eph.

Eph. ii. 9. Not of works, left any man should boast. And at this rate, indeed, it is a covenant of pure grace; and all ground of boafting is taken away from us; the Lord Jefus Chrift himself, as a reprefentative, being fole undertaker and performer of the conditions thereof. But it is not fo, if it is made with the finner himself, ftanding as principal party, contracting with God, and undertaking and performing the conditions of the covenant for life: for how low foever thefe conditions, undertaken and wrought by the finner in his own perfon, are fuppofed to be, the promise of the covenant is made to them: and fo, according to the fcripture-reckoning, it is a covenant of works, Rom. iv. 4. Now to him that worketh, is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt; and betwixt Adam's covenant and fuch a covenant, there is no difference, but in degree, which leaves it ftill of the fame kind.

4. This method was taken, that the communication of righteoufnefs and life might be in as com pendious a way, as the communication of fin and death was As by one man's disobedience many were made finners; fo by the obedience of one fhall many be made righteous, Rom. v. 19. The covenant of works having been made with Adam as a reprefentative of、 his natural feed, upon the breaking thereof, fin and death are communicate to them all from him as a deadly head. This being fo, it was not agreeable to the method of divine procedure with men, to treat with those predeftinated unto falvation feverally, as principal parties, each contracting for himfelf in the new covenant for life; but to treat for them all as one public perfon, who through his fulfilling of the covenant, should be a quickening head to them, from whence life might be derived to them, in as compendious a way, as death was from the firft Adam. For his mercies are above all his other works.

5. Lastly,

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