DISCOURSE III. PART I. MATTHEW Xi. 6. Bleffed is he who foever shall not be offended in me. IN the beginning of this chapter we read, that the Baptist sent two of his difciples to Chrift, to inquire of him whether he was indeed the great Prophet fo long expected by the people, and foretold by the prophets, or whether they were still to expect and wait the coming of another. Our Saviour detained the difciples of John, till he had made them eye-witneffes of the mighty power that was in him. They faw, at the command of his word, the blind receive fight, the lame walk, the lepers cleanfed, the deaf reftored to hearing, and the dead raised up to life again: they faw likewise, that these mighty powers were exercised without giving the leaft fufpicion of any worldly defign; that no court was made to the great or wealthy by fingling them out either for patients or for difciples. The benefit of the miracles was chiefly the lot of the poor; and as they were better disposed to receive the Gospel, fo were they preferred before the rich and mighty to be the disciples of Chrift. When the Baptift's difciples had seen and heard these things, our Saviour thought them fufficiently enabled to fatisfy John in the inquiry upon which he had fent them: Go, fays he, and fhew John those things which ye do hear and fee: the blind receive their fight, and the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear; the dead are raised up, and the poor have the Gospel preached to them. Then follow immediately the words of the text: And blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in me. The clofe connection of the text with the laft words of the fifth verfe fhews us what fort of perfons our Saviour had in his eye, when he spoke of the offence taken at him in the world: The poor, fays he, have the Gospel preached to them: and blessed is he whofoever shall not be offended in me. As if he had faid, the poor are ready to embrace the Gofpel, and happy are in this, yea happier far, notwithftanding their prefent uncomfortable condition, than the honourable and the learned, who are too great, and in their own opinion too wife, to hearken to the inftructions of the Gospel. The words thus explained lead us to inquire, Firft, What are the offences which are generally taken at the Gospel of Chrift: Secondly, From what fource thefe offences come. The poverty and meannefs in which our Saviour appeared, was the earlieft, and may probably be the lateft, objection to the Gofpel. He came from God to convert and to fave the world, to declare the purposes and the commands of the Almighty, and to exact obedience from every creature; but he came with lefs attendance and fhew than if he had been an ordinary meffenger from the governor of a province. Hence it is, that we fo often find him upbraided either with the meanness of his parentage, the obscurity of his country, or the present neceffity of his circumftances: Is not this the Carpen-, ter's fon? fays one; Can any good come out of Nazareth? says another; or any prophet out of Galilee? fays a third. And when they faw him oppreffed with fufferings, and weighed down with afflictions, they openly infulted his forrow, and triumphed over his fond pretences to fave the world: Thou, fay they, that destroyeft the temple, and buildeft it in three days, fave thyself: If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross. And fo blinded are men with the notions of worldly greatness, and so apt to conceive of the majefty of God according to their. own ideas of power and dignity, that this prejudice. has prevailed in every age. The Apostle to the Corinthians preached Chrift crucified; but he was to the Jews a ftumbling-block, and to the Greeks foolishness for the Jews required a fign, a vifible temporal deliverance, and had no notion, much less any want, as they could apprehend, of such a Saviour as Jefus. The Greeks fought after wisdom, and thought that, if God were indeed to redeem the world, he would act more fuitably to his power and wifdom: whenever they made their Jupiter speak, his voice was thunder, and lightning was his appearance, and he delivered oracles not to be communicated to vulgar ears. So in the Old Testament, when God fpeaks, clouds and darkness are : 1 round about him, and his prefence and his voice are terrible. But here every thing had a different turn: the appearance was in the likeness of a man, and in the form of a fervant; and, as he came in like a fervant, he went out like a flave, he was efteemed Stricken, and his departure was taken for mifery. His doctrine was framed rather to purify the heart, and to give wisdom to the fimple, than to exercise the head, and furnish matter for the curious and learned; to be a general inftruction and a common rule of life to all men, and not to fatisfy the vanity of worldly wisdom in inquiries above its reach. With him the precepts of virtue are the principles of wisdom and holinefs, the greateft ornament of the mind of man. But these things the wife and the great men of the world find hard to reconcile with the wisdom and majefty of God, according to their notions of wisdom and power. Why did not Chrift, fay they, appear in the power and majefty of his Father? Would not the embaffy have been more worthy both of God and of him? Would any prince, who had a mind to reclaim his rebellious fubjects to obedience, not rather choose to send a person of honour with a fuitable retinue, whofe appearance might command refpect and credit, than an ambaffador clothed in rags and poverty, fit only to create in the rebels a greater contempt both of himself and his prince? If it was the purpose of God, that the world through faith should be saved, would not the world more fecurely and readily have confided in one whose very appearance would have fpoke his dignity, than in one who feemed to be even more |