THE UNITY AND EQUALITY OF THE

Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,

DEMONSTRATED AND IMPROVED.

SERMON IV.

GENESIS, CHAPTER III, VERSE 23.

And the Lord God said, Behold the man is become as one of us.

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FAVOURED as we are with the light

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it

of revelation, we cannot but esteem an high privilege to search its contents, and to draw from it those instructions which are able to make us wise unto salvation. Numerous and important as the particulars are which this blessed book contains, those which relate to that God, on whom the issues of our present and eternal state depenů, must necessarily be considered the most weighty and interesting. This remark will, it is hoped, be sufficient to bespeak your candid and serious attention, my brethren, to a few observations on the nature of God as existing in a three-fold plurality of persons in one Jehovah. As this idea of God is only obtained from the revelation which he has made of himself, the proofs in favour of it must, of

course, be exclusively collected from that revelation. And, if we can but simply believe, that God is able to give a proper account of himself, it will not be found difficult to form just sentiments respecting him. And surely it is much more reasonable to conclude, that God's description of his own nature is more likely to be right, than that which short-sighted mortals would give of him, independent of his own revelation! Let us then act the reasonable part of permitting God to speak for himself, and let us take our ideas of him from his own account. It is readily admitted, that his description of his own nature is what the wisdom and reason of man would never have discovered; but is this a sufficient cause for it to be rejected? If it be contrary to wisdom, reason, good sense, it ought to be rejected: but surely it cannot be contrary to these, merely because our limited powers would never have conceived it to be so, had it not been revealed! No, a plurality of persons in the Godhead is no more opposite to reason and good sense, than the idea that the three distinct properties of body, soul, and spirit, make but one man. These considerations being premised, with a view to obtain a candid and impartial attention to God's account of himself in his own word, our remarks shall be immediately directed to the subject proposed. This will lead us to shew,

or

I. That there is a plurality of

the Godhead, and

persons in

II. That this plurality is three-fold, consisting of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; equal in every respect with each other, in the unity of one divine essence.

The existence of God in one undivided nature cannot be too strenuously asserted. “I, even I am he," is his own declaration, "and there is no God with me." "Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I am the first and I am the last, and beside me there is no God.” But then, the same revelation of himself teaches, that this unity of God is not an unity of person, but of nature or essence. Hence we observe that in the unity of the Godhead there is a plurality of persons. For the first proof of this, let a reference be made to the words of the Text. There it is written, "And the Lord God said, behold the man is become as one of us." Here it will be perceived that the Lord God calls himself us. The Lord God evidently denotes the unity of his nature as Supreme God; the pronoun us, the plurality of persons existing in that nature. If this be not the case, what reason can be assigned for God speaking of himself in a plural sense? Some indeed have said, that he adopted this

method of speech to express his greatness and majesty, because it is customary with kings and supreme governors to do so, when they would intimate their dignity and authority. But such an idea is fraught with absurdity; for how could the blessed God borrow his method of speaking of himself from that which kings adopt, when not a king had ever existed when he thus spoke? Nor indeed is this his mode of speech when he would denote his supreme authority: Then he says, "I, even I am the Lord, and beside me there is no Saviour:" "I have sworn

by myself that unto me every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall swear*." Indeed the phrase, "one of us," will not apply to the method of speaking adopted by kings. For although a king can say, we, and us, and our, yet he cannot say one of us, unless he has some other person or persons in view in conjunction with himself. Nothing therefore can be more evident, than that the words under consideration imply a plurality of persons in the Godhead.

Ifaiah, chap. xliii. ver. 11, and ch. xlv. ver. 23. The attentive reader will recollect that these paffages are applicable to CHRIST. He is the only "SAVIOUR." Acts, ch. iv. ver. 12. And "to him every knee shall bow," in rendering honour to him even as to the Father. Philip. ch. ii. ver. 10. John ch. v, ver. 23. In addition, therefore, to their evidence in proof of God ufing the SINGULAR NUMBER to express his dignity, they afford a striking demonstration of the Supreme Deity of the Saviour.

The same truth will be still more strongly confirmed by an enumeration of a few other scriptures to the same purport. In Genesis. i. 26, we read thus-"And God said let us make man in our image, after our likeness.' In the xi. chap. 6 and 7 v. of the same book it is written, "And the Lord said, let us go down and there confound," (i. e. and let us confound, according to the Hebrew verb,) "their language." Another passage of a

similar nature occurs in Isaiah vi. 8. "I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" It may here also be remarked, that the Hebrew word Elohim, which we translate God, is of a plural signification-another certain demonstration that there are more persons than one united in the divine nature. An instance or two of this may be mentioned. In Joshua xxiv. 19, is this declaration, "Ye cannot serve the Lord, for he is an holy God;" the literal translation of which is, for he is a God who are holy ones. In Psalm lviii. 12, it is said, "Doubtless there is a God, that judgeth the earth;" the original of which is, a God who are judging the earth. Various other nouns applicable to God, must also be understood in the plural sense. In Malachi i. 6, we read thus-"If I be a master where is my fear?"-the precise meaning however is, "If I be masters." "Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth." Eccles. xii. 1.-the word Creator