Hebrews 3:19

REFLECTIONS

PAUSE, my soul, and cheerfully obey, the Lord the Spirit, and consider, as thou art commanded and hast such abundant reason to do; consider, the Apostle and High Priest of thy profession Christ Jesus! Yes! thou glorious God and Savior! I would desire to contemplate thy Person, character, offices, and relations! I would desire grace, and a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of thee, to behold thee in all that concerns thy Mediatorial glory, in thy faithfulness to thy Father, and to thy people. I would gaze on thee, until my whole soul was swallowed up in the contemplation; and until that I found myself one with my Lord in that house, over which, as his own, Christ is the rightful owner; and which house, is Christ's body the Church, and He the fullness which filleth all in all.

And do thou, Almighty God the Holy Ghost, give me continual grace, to keep in remembrance thy precious exhortation to thy people. Lord! let nothing of sin cleave to my poor fallen nature; neither suffer me to be at any time hardened with the deceitfulness of it. Oh! the long suffering of my God, to the forty years provocation of the people in the wilderness! Oh! the numberless years of the Lord's long suffering now! Cause me, 0 Lord, to mark that grace which kept back thy people from murmuring then, when the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt by Moses; that though some, (even the Israel after the flesh), when they had heard, did provoke; yet not all, (even those whom grace restrained.) They fell not after the same example of unbelief. And cause me, 0 Lord, to know now, that it is grace, and grace alone, by which any are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. Do thou, 0 Lord the Holy Ghost! who here so sweetly holds forth our great and glorious Apostle, and High Priest, Jesus Christ, to thy Church's view, give grace to the apprehension and knowledge of Him; that through thy blessed influences thy people may all rejoice in him, to the praise of the glory of His grace, who hath made us accepted in the Beloved.