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there is an hour, or certain fixed period of time, appointed of God for it. We are not told when that hour will be, but that it is coming : for this, among other reafons, that we may always be ready.

DOCTRINE.

There ball be a Refurrection of the Dead.

In difcourfing of this fubject, I fhall first thew the certainty of the refurrection; next, I fhall inquire into the nature of it; and laftly, make fome practical improvement of the whole.

I. In fhewing the certainty of the refurrection, I fhall evince, (1.) That God can raise the dead. And, (2.) That he will do it; which are the two grounds or topics laid down by Christ himself, when difputing with the Sadduc es, Matth xxii. 29. Jefus answered and faid unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the fcriptures, nor "the power of God."

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Fift, Seeing God is almighty, furely he can raife the dead. have inftances of this powerful work of God, both in the Old and New Teftament. The fon of the widow in Sarept, was raifed from the dead, 1 Kings xvii 22. The Shunamite's fon, 2 Kings iv 35. And the man caft into the fepulchre of. Elisha, chap. xiii. 21. In which we may obferve a gradation, the fecond of thefe miraculaus events being more illuftrious than the firft, and the third than the second. The fi ft of the fe perfons was raised when he was but newly dead the prophet Elijah who raifed him, being prefent at his decease. The Second, when he had lain dead a confiderable time; namely, while his mother travelled from Shunem to mount Carmel, (reckoned about the diftance of fixteen miles) and returned from thence to her houfe with Eifha, who railed him. The lift, not till they were burying him, and the corpfe was caft into the prophet's grave. In like manner in the New Testament, Fairu's daughter, (Mark v. 41.) and Dorcas, (Acts,ix. 40) were both raifed to life, when lat ly dead; the widow's fon in Nain, when they were carrying him out to bury him, Luke vii. 11,15. And Lazarus, when /tinking in the grave, John xi. 39, 44. Can men make curious glaffes out of afhes, reduce flowers into ashes, and raise them again out of thefe afhes, reftoring them to their former beauty; and cannot the great Creator, who made all things of nothing, raife man's body, after it is reduced into duft? If it be objected, How can men's bodies be raised up again after they are diffolved into duft, and the afhes of many generations are mingled together? Scripture and not reafon furnish the, anfwer; With men it is impoffi ble, but not with God. It is abfurd for men to deny that God can do a thing, because they fee not how it may be done. How finall a portion do we know of his ways! how abfolutely incapable are we of conceiving distinctly of the extent of almighty power, and much more of comprehending its actings, and the method of procedure! I queftion not,

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but many illiterate men are as great infidels to many chymical experi. ments, as fome learned men are to the doctrine of the refurrection: and as these last are ready to deride the former, fo the Lord will have them in derifi n. What a mystery was it to the Indians, that the Europeans could, by a piece of paper converfe together, at the distance of fome hundreds of milés? And how much were they astonished to fee them with their guns, produce as it were thunder and lightning in a moment, and at pleature kill men afar off? Shall fome men do fuch things as are wonders in the eyes of others, because they cannot comprehend them: and thall men confine the infinite power of God within the narrow boundaries of their own fhallow capacities, in a matter noways contrary to reafon? An inferior nature has but a very imperfect conception of the power of á fuperior. Brutes do not conceive of the actings of reafon in men; and men have but lame notions of the power of angels: how lame and inadequate a conception, then, muit a finite nature have of the power of that which is finite! tho' we cannot conceive how God acts yet we ought to believe he can do above what we can think or can conceive of.

Wherefore, let the bodies of men be laid in the grave; let them rot there, and be refolved into the most minute particles: or let them be burnt, and the ashes calt into rivers, or thrown up into the air, to be fcattered by the wind: let the duft of a thousand generations be mingled, and the ftreams of the dead bodies wander to and fro in the air: let birds or wild beafts eat the dead bodies, or the fithes of the sea devour them, fo that the parts of human bodies, thus deitroyed, pafs into fubftantial parts of birds, beafts, or fifhes; or what is more than that, let man-eaters, who themselves muit die, and rife again, devour human bodies; and let others devour them again: and then let our modern Sadducees propofe the question in these cates; as the ancient Sad-ucces did, in the cafe of the woman, who had been married to feven husbands fucceffively, Matth. xxii. 8. We anfver, as our bleffed Lord and Saviour did, ver. 26. Ye no er, not knowing the fcrip.ures, nor the power of God. We believe God to be omni/crent and omnipent: infinite in knowledge and in pwr and hence, agreeable to the dictates of reafon we conclude the poffibility of the refurrection, even in the cafes fuppofed.

Material things may change their forms and shapes, may be refolved into the principles of which they are formed: but they are not annihilated, or reduced to nothing; nor can they be fo, by any created power. God is omnifcient his unde ftanding is infinite therefore he knows all things whatfoever; what they were at any time, what they are and where they are to be found. Though the country-man, who comes into the apothecary's fhop, cannot find out the drug he wants; yet the apothecary himfelf knows what he has in his fhop, whence it came, and where it is to be found. And in a mingle of many different feeds, the expert gardener can diftinguish betwixt feed and feed. Why then may not onniscience diftinguilh betwixt duft and duft? Can he who

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knows all things to perfection be liable to any mistake about his own creatures? Whofo believes an infinite unde ftanding inuft needs own, that no mass of duft is fo jumbled together, but God perfectly comprehends, and infallibly knows how the moft minute particle, and every one of them, is to be matched. And therefore, he knows where the particles of each dead body are; whether in the earth, fea, or air, how confused foever they ly. And particularly, he knows where to find the primitive fubftance of the man-eater; how foever evaporated or reduced, as it were into air or vapour. by fweat or perfpiration: and how to separate the parts of the body that was eaten, from the body of the eater, how foever incorporate, or made one body with it: and fo understands, not only how, but whence, he is to bring back the pri mitive fubitance of the man-eater to ts proper place: and alfo to feparate. from the man eater's body, that part of the devoured body which goes into its fubitance, and is indeed but a very small part of it. It is certain the bodies of men, as of all other animals, or living creatures, are in a continual flux: they grow, and are fuftained by daily food; fo fmall a part whereof becomes nourishment, that the most part is evacuate. And it is reckoned that, at least, as much of the food is evacuate infenfibly by perspiration, as is voided by other perceptible ways. Yea, the nourishing part of the food, when affimilate, and thereby become a part of the body, is evacuate by perfpiration through the pores of the fkin, and again fupplied by the ufe of the food: yet the body is ftill reckoned one, and the fame body. Whence we may conclude, that it is not effential to the refurrection of the body, that every particle of the matter, which at any time was part of a human body thould be reftored to it, when it is raifed up from death to life. Were it fo, the bodies of men would become of fo huge a size, that they would bear no resemblance of the perfons. It is fufficient to denominate it theme body that died, when it is rifen again; if the body that is raised. be formed in its former proportions of the jame particles of matter, which at any time were its conftituent parts, howfoever it be refined likeas we reckon it is the finame body that was pined away by long fickness, which becomes fat and fair again after recovery. Now to this infinite unde ftanding join infinite power, whereby he is able in fubdue all thig, unto himself; and this glorious great work appears most reafonable. If omniscience difcover every little particle of duft, where it is, and how it is to be matched; cannot omnipotence bring them, and join them together in their order? Can the watchmaker take up the feveral pieces of a watch, lying in a confused heap before him, and fet each in its proper place; and cannot God put the human body into order, ofter its diffolution! Did he speak this world into being out of nothing; and can he not form man's body out of its pre-exiftent matter? If he callete thofe things, which be not, as though they were furely he can call things that are diffolved, to be as they were before the compound was refolved into its parts and principles: Wherefore, God can raise the dead. And, "Why thould it be thought

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"a thing incredible with you, that God fhould raise the dead? Acts xxvi. 8.

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Secondly, God will do it. He not only can do it; but he certainly will do it, becaufe he has faid it. Our text is very full to this purpofe, All that are in their graves fhall hear his voice: and thall c me forth; they that have done good, unto the refurrection of "life, and they that have done evil, unto the refurrection of "damnation." Thefe words relate to, and are an explanation of, that part of Daniel's prophecy, Dan. xii. 2. "And many of them that fleep in the duit of the earth fhall awake, fome to everlasting life, and fome to fhame and everlasting contempt." The which appears to have been calculate to confront the doctrine of the Sadducees; which the Holy Ghoft knew was to be at a great height, in the Jewish church, under the perfecution of Antiochus. There are many other texts in the Old and New Tellaments that might here be adduced; fuch as Acts xxiv. 15. "And have hope towards God,

which they them!elves alfo allow, that there fhall be a refurrec. **tion of the dead, of the just and unjuft.” And Job xx. 26, 27. "And though after my fkin worms deftroy this body, yet in my "flefh fhall I fee God: whom I shall fee for myself, and mine eyes

fhall behold, and not another; though my reins be confumed ❝ within me.” But I need not multiply teftimonies, in a matter fo clearly and frequently taught in facred feripture. Our Lord and saviour himfeif proves it, against the Sadducees, in that re, markable text, Luke xx. 37, 38. "Now that the dead are raifed,

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even Mofes fhewed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord, the "the God of Abraham, and the God of Ifaac, and the God of Jacob; For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him." Thefe holy patriarchs were now dead: nevertheless, the Lord JEROVAR is called their God, namely, in virtue of the covenant of grace, and in the fenfe thereof; in which sense, the phrafe comprehends all bl fedness, as that, which by the cove nant, is fecured to them who are in it, Heb. xi. 16. "God is not afhamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them 46 a city. "He is not cailed the God of their fouls only; but their God, the God of their perfons, fouls and bodies; the which, by virtue of his truth and faithrulness, muft have its full effect; now it cannot have its full effect on the dead, who, in as far as they are dead, are far from all bleffedness; but on the living, who alone are capable of it; therefore, fince God is ftill called their God, they are living in respect of God, although their bodies are yet in the grave; for in refpect of him, who by his power can restore them to life, and in his covenant has declared his will and purpofe fo to do, and whose promife cannot fail, they all are to be reckoned to live: and, con. fiftent with the covenant, their death is but a fleep, out of which, in virtue of the fame covenant, fecuring all bl fedness to their perfans, ther whole man, they muft and fhail ceriamly be awakened.

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The Apostle Paul proves the refurrection at large, 1 Cor. xv. and fhews it to be a fundamental article, the denial whereof is fubver.. five of Chriftianity, ver. 13, 14. "If there be no refurrection of "the dead, then is Chrift not rifen. And if Chrift be not rife, "then is our preaching vain, and your faith alfo in vain ”

To affift us in conceiving of it, the fcripture give us types of the refurrection of the dead; as the dry bones living, Ezek. xxxvi. Jonah's coming out of the whale's belly. Mat. xii. 40. And nature a fords us emblems and refemblances of it, as the fun's fetting and rifing again; night and day, winter and fummer, fleeping and awak ing; fwallows in winter lying void of all appearance of lite, i ruinous buildings, and fubterraneous caverns, and reviving again in the fpring feafon; the feeds dying under the clod, and thereafte Springing up again all which, and the like, may justly be admitted. as defigned by the God of nature, though not for proofs, yet for, memorials, of the refurrection; whereof we have affurance from the fcripture, 1 Cor. xv. 36. "Thou fool, that which thou fowell "is not quickned, except it die "

III fhall enquire into the nature of the refurrection, fhewing ift, Who fhall be raifed. 2dly, What shall be raised. 3dly, How the dead fhall be raised.

First, Who fhall be raifed. Our text tells us who they are; namely All that are in the graves, i. e. all mankind, who are dead i.e. As for thofe perfons who fhall be found alive at the fecond coming of Chrift; they fhall not die, and foon thereafter be rifed again: but fuch a change fhall fuddenly pass upon them, as shall be to them in Itead of dying and rifing again; fo that their bodies fhall become like to thofe bodies which are raifed out of the graves, 1 Cor. xv 51, 52. "We fhall not all fleep, but we fhall all be changed; i 66 a moment, in the twinkling of an eye." Hence thefe who are to be judged at the great day, are diftinguished into quick and dead Acts x 42. All the dead fhall arife, whether godly or wicked, juft or unjust, (Acts xxiv. 15.) old or young: the whole race of man kind, even these who never faw the fun, but died in their mother's belly, Rev. xx 12. "And I faw the dead fmall and great ftand before God." The fea and earth fhall give up their dead, without referve none thall be kept back.

Secondly, What fhall be raised? The bodies of mankind. A man is faid to die when the foul is feparated from the body, and returns unto God who gave it, Ecclef. xii 7. But it is the body only which is laid in the grave, and can be properly faid to be raised; where. fore the refurrection is, ftri&ly fpeaking, comperent to the body only. Moreover, it is the fame body that dies, which fall rife again. At the refurrection, men fhall not appear with other bodies for fubftance, than thefe which they now have, and which are laid down in the grave: but with the felf-fame bodies endowed with other qualities. The very notion of a refurrection implies this;

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