THE GLORIOUS GOSPEL

“The glorious Gospel of the blessed God”. 1st Tim. 1,11 Jehovah in His divine personalities — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost — is the great, never to be circumscribed fountain, spring, and source of all blessedness and blessednesses, in, and of, and to Himself (Romans 1, 25). He cannot be more blessed, neither can He be less, Who only hath immortality (1st Tim. 6, 16), and derives His unmeasured and inconceivable bliss, blessedness, and happiness from none (Psalm 1, 12). Had there never been a creature formed, He would never have needed any: had Gabriel’s harp never have been tuned, He would never have needed it, (Acts 17, 25). But, 0 my soul, for ever, ever praise His name, that such a thought should have originated in His breast to create, and that from among the creatures (though as yet there was none of them), Psalm 139, 16; Romans 4, 17). For the children not being yet born, neither having done either good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him that calleth (Romans 9, 11), should be pleased to select and choose for Himself (Psalm 135, 4), an infinite number to grace and glory — hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour and another unto dishonour? (Romans 9, 21) and to give His chosen ones an everlasting well-being in the Person of God-man the Son of God, subsisting as such secretly in the womb of the divine counsels, and that from everlasting past, having chosen them in Him, and blessed them in Him with all spiritual blessings (Eph. 1, 34). All that is communicable in God of blessedness, His one dear church possessed in her one-glorious Head and Husband before the world began (2nd Tim. 1-9). For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell, in Whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, and of His fulness have all we received (all we who are born again, and have vital union with a precious Christ by the Divine anointing which teacheth all things essential to salvation), and grace for grace; therefore blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, and the people whom He hath chosen for His own inheritance (Psalm 33, 12). Happy is that people that is in such a case; yea, happy is that people whose God is the Lord (Psalm 144,15).

Let us now proceed to notice briefly (for the limits of a tract will admit no more) some few of the features of what this inspired apostle calls (and rightly so too) the glorious Gospel of the blessed God, of which God Himself is the Author, Christ the subject matter, the Holy Ghost the gracious Revealer, the election of grace, the members of the mystic body, the persons to whom and in whom a revelation of this glorious Gospel is made (Matt. 13, 11), from others hid (2nd Cor. 4, 3). The Holy Ghost calls it good news from a far country (Prov. 25, 25); a good report (Prov. 15, 30); a joyful sound (Psalm 89, 15); good tidings (Isa. 40, 9); good tidings of great joy (Luke 2, 10). And sure I am it is all this, and much more, to a poor, sensible, law-wrecked sinner, who apprehends himself exposed as to wrath divine, when the Lord enables him to hear, with a circumcised ear, the proclamation of pardon, mercy, and peace, in and through Jesus Christ our Lord; to him it is, and to his guilty soul, the most important and interesting news Jehovah ever proclaimed, or he ever heard — everlasting love, everlasting mercy, everlasting peace, grace overflowing all the banks of sin and sinfulness, everlasting union, everlasting relationship, everlasting oneness, an everlasting covenant and everlasting Covenanters (2nd Samuel 23, 2, 3, 4, and 5); everlasting salvation (Isa. 45, 17), an everlasting atonement (Heb. 13, 20), everlasting righteousness (Dan. 9, 24), and everlasting acceptance (Eph. 1, 6). I do not, therefore, wonder that this Gospel is called the Everlasting Gospel (Rev. 14, 6), since it proclaims such everlasting great and glorious good things (Romans 10, 15). Our God fills His hungry ones with such good things, but the rich He sends empty away (Luke 1, 53). See His poor, starving prodigals when He brings them to His Gospel table, being weary of the husks on which swine feed (creature doings and false doctrines), sitting down to the fatted calf, the slaughtered Lamb, the feast of fat things, full of marrow, wines on the lees well refined, the Master sits, serves, and smiles, addresses His guests with — Eat, O friends, drink, yea drink abundantly, O My beloved: ye shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, that hath dealt wondrously with you: and My people shall never be ashamed (Joel 2, 26); give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts; let him drink and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more (Prov. 31,6 and 7). And, sure I am, if ever a poor sinner forgets his misery, the law’s curse, his death, sin, and woe, ‘tis only as the Lord the Spirit enables him to feast on love and blood.

Infinitely preferable is the glorious Gospel of the blessed God to that made-up human scheme of this Christ-despising generation, consisting of yea and nay, works and grace, creature and Creator; no one can tell what is piped or harped — such hideous and discordant sounds; but the sheep did not hear them (John 10, 8), that is, they, would not, being better taught.

Again, a considerable branch of this glorious Gospel is the doctrine (and He makes His doctrine drop as the rain, and distill as the dew, Deut. 32, 2) of God’s eternal free, absolute, and irreversible election of some persons in Christ to everlasting life (Acts 13, 48). His dear people were singled out in His eternal purpose and choice, to be endued with faith in spiritual regeneration, and thereby fitted for their destined salvation by their interest in the gratuitous, unalienable love of the glorious Trinity; thus constituted believers, their whole salvation, from the first plan of it in the Divine mind to the consumation of it in eternal glory, is at once a matter of mere grace an absolute certainty (Romans 11, 6, 7). Our God is neither an unwise, a feeble, nor a capricious architect. He does not form a wretched scheme, liable to be frustrated, and which will hardly hang together at the best; but His wisdom is consummate, and all is well ordered, all sure, all is everlasting, and nothing is consigned to after thought or peradventure, therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace, to the end the promise (containing the life that now is and that which is to come), might be sure to all the seed (Romans 4, 16), and but for absolute predestination it would be sure to nobody.

It is called the glorious Gospel moreover, not only for its discovering a glorious purpose, a glorious salvation (every way suited to a poor sinner), a glorious atonement, a glorious righteousness, and a glorious security of all the heirs of salvation, notwithstanding all the storms, troubles, trials, and afflictions to which they are all more or less subject in the wilderness, the rage of men, and the malice of devils, and at last a glorious entrance into His everlasting kingdom; but it is a revelation of the Person of our most glorious Christ (Rev. 1, 1). I pray you mark His Person; His work is said to be honourable and glorious (Psalm 111, 3), and so indeed it is; but what must then be His Person Whom all the heavens adore — before Whom cherubims vail their faces — before Whom the heavens and earth shall flee away? John said, When I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead (Rev. 1, 17). Isaiah, Woe is me (Isa. 6, 5). Job, Behold I am vile (Job 41,4). David, Who am I, O Lord God? (1st Chron. 17, 16). Daniel, For my comeliness was turned in me to corruption (Daniel 10, 8). Moses trembled and durst not behold (Acts 7, 32). Peter I am a sinful man, O Lord. (Luke 5, 8). Paul, I am less than the least of all saints (Eph. 3, 8). These confessions of absolute nothingness and sinfulness were the effect of the most exalted and soul humbling views these inspired men of God were favoured with of the Person of God the Son, the covenant Head of His body the Church, Who is her wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.

Once more, it is called the Gospel of the grace of God (Acts 20, 24). And every blessing contained therein is said to be to the praise of the glory of His grace (Eph. 1, 6); election, adoption, union, relationship, salvation, justification, sanctification, regeneration, effectual calling, divine renewings, pardon, peace, preservation, final glorification are all blessings of covenant love, sure mercies of David. The grace of the Holy Three is the vast ocean from whence flow all these streams which make glad the city of God (Psalm 46, 4). This, therefore, is a brief outline of that Gospel which was preached by Paul and his Master, yea, by all the sent servants of our God; and our apostle declared that though we, or an angel from heaven, preached any other Gospel unto you (not that he supposed this could be the case, but to carry the greater weight,) than that ye have received, let him be accursed (Gal. 1, 8). Here, then, we have a precious Christ set forth as having died for our sins, and rose again for our justification, our Surety, Sponsor, Kinsman, Redeemer. In Him and His finished salvation all the Divine perfections harmonise, centre, and blaze forth in one full constellation (Psalm 85, 10). Here, as in a focus, all the rays of revelation meet and shine (Rev. 19, 10). The Gospel is the covenant of grace unfolded, the vast transactions of eternity developed, the wisdom of God in a mystery laid open, the banqueting house; and many a poor perishing sinner has fed and has been feasted here, which are now before the throne, and serve Him day and night in His temple; here is wheat, wine, and oil, for the young of the flock and of the herd, yea, royal dainties, savoury meat, such as my soul loveth. What say you, poor sinner? Hast thou an appetite? Dost thou know what it is to hunger and thirst after righteousness? Is the language of thine heart, “Give me Christ or I die?” Is the enmity of thine heart slain? Hath the Lord brought thee at His footstool with the cry of the Publican, breathed from thy very soul, in thy own view ruined, lost, and dead? Jesus receiveth sinners, and eateth with them. Ho, every one that thirsteth! Thy case is not hopeless. He saveth to the uttermost, and His crown depends upon His bringing home the purchase of His blood, however desperate their case. One said the Gospel was a plaster, but Christ’s hand only could make it stick. This I know by experience, that precious as are the ordinances of the Gospel, His Majesty must put the preciousness in the one and the glory in the other; or, in other words, put precious faith into act and exercise, and bring His Gospel home with power. The letter killeth, the Spirit giveth life — the Lord the Spirit will make the word of His grace effectual in the hearts of all the jewels of Immanuel’s crown, and thereby seal the heirs of salvation unto the day of redemption (Eph. 4, 30).

Take heed then what you hear. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him Godspeed. (2nd John 10). Now to Him that is of power to stablish you, according to my Gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began; but now is made manifest (Romans 16, 25), and life and immortality is brought to light through the Gospel; the Lord of all lords, leads His children more and more into its glory and fulness, keep them ever from being ashamed of His Gospel and enable them to walk worthy of their vocation, and let their conversation be as it becometh the Gospel of Christ, contending earnestly for the faith once delivered unto the saints — Amen.

“The glorious Gospel of our God,
Is joyful news from heaven,
Salvation free in Jesus’ blood,
And life eternal given.”

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