James Hervey

“ He hath made all his glory to pass before the astonished eyes of angels, and of men. ———Here justice has set her most awful terrors in array: even while goodness appears, with inexpressible loveliness, and the most attractive beauty. Here, truth, more unshaken than a rock, takes her immoveable stand; and mercy, tenderer than the mother's tear, yearns with bowels of everlasting pity.———In a word; the cross of Christ is a conspicuous theatre, on which all the divine perfections unite, and harmonize, and shine forth with transcendent lustre. ”

“ True morality is the image of the blessed God: it is most charmingly delineated throughout the whole Bible: it is the beginning of heaven in the human soul; and its proper origin is from the Cross of our divine Master. For, through the merits of his death, sinners are made partakers of the holy Spirit; who writes upon their hearts, and makes legible in their conversation, what was anciently written upon the mitre mitre of the high-priest, Holiness to the Lord.———And oh! what a motive is the Cross of Christ to the exercise of every virtue! ”

“ God’s own Son transfixed with the arrows of justice: we may bid them consider, if judgment begins with the immaculate Mediator, where shall the irreclaimable sinner appear? how will he escape the stroke? how bear the weight of God’s everlasting vengeance?— Would we comfort the distressed? we may point them to an atonement, whose merits are infinite, and able to save to the very uttermost: we may lead them to a righteousness, whose efficacy is unbounded, and sufficient to justify the ungodly. ”

“ Glory be to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men.
“By the birth of this wonderful Child, and the death he shall sustain, peace is made between heaven and earth: and not peace only, but a divine friendship commences. God regards the poor apostate race of men, not only without indignation, but with complacency and delight. He rejoices over them to do them good.”
Another benefit is holiness; or, if you please, the true, the Christian morality. Let none think, the believer in Jesus disparages true morality. ”

“ It becomes the tree of life; it bears the divinest fruit; its clusters are all spiritual and heavenly blessings. Two or three of those clusters you will permit me to select; and may the God of all mercy make them better than a feast to every humble soul.
One blessing is the pardon of sin; the pardon of all in, original and actual: sin that is remembered, and sin that is forgotten; sin, however circumstanced, or however aggravated. The pardon of all was purchased by the death of Christ;———completely purchased:—so that, against the true believer, sin shall never rise up in judgment ”

“ Can I conclude, without adding a word of admonition to the wicked? those, I mean, who are enemies to the Cross of Christ; who mind earthly things, but neither hunger nor thirst after righteousness.— My soul remembers the wormwood and the gall of such a state, and cannot but tenderly pity these unhappy people.— Alas! my friends, what have you to glory in? The devil and his angels expect ere long to glory in your destruction. Those malignant fiends are eyeing you as their prey, and are impatient to begin your torment. ”

“ As Christians, we have, in the cross of Christ, the richest provision for our spiritual wants. This is a foundation of the sublimest hope, and a fountain of the most exuberant joy. This affords matter for the deepest humility, and yields fuel for the most flaming love. Faith in our crucified Jesus, is an ever-active principle of the most cheerful and exact obedience: is an ample and inexhaustible magazine, from which we may fetch arms to conquer ”

“ Go to dying beds there you will learn its true worth. Ask some agonizing friend; he, and he alone, can tell you, what a blessing it is to have the king of terrors converted into a messenger of peace.
One blessing more I would mention, and earnestly with it, in due time, to all my hearers; An entrance into heaven. This too is the produce of our Redeemer's cross. ”

“ Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth, who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died.— Then shall you enter the harbour of eternal rest; not like a shipwrecked mariner, cleaving to some broken plank, and hardly escaping the raging waves ”

“ And is there a topic in the whole compass of oratory, is there an argument amidst all the stores of reason, so admirably calculated to touch the finest movements of the soul? to strike all the inmost springs of action, with the most persuasive, the most commanding energy?— Would we alarm the supine, or intimidate the presumptuous? we may call them to behold God’s own Son weltering in blood. ”

“ Beware, I beseech you beware, lest you build for eternity, not on a rock, but on the sand. However you may appear in your own fight, before the adorable majesty of the everlasting God, before the consummate perfection of his holy law, you are less than nothing; you are worse than nothing. ”

“ Another blessing is victory over death.———This also is the fruit of that once detested, but now ever beloved tree. For thus it is written, That, through death, he might destroy him that had the power of death that is the devil; and deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their life-time subject to bondage. The devil is said to have the power of death: because, by tempting too successfully our first parents, he brought death into the world; because, by tempting their posterity to sin, and too often prevailing, he arrays death in horror; he arms death with its sling. ”

“ Those, who more frequently think of their own piety than of Christ's obedience; are more apt to cry out with the Pharisee, I am no extortioner, no adulterer; than to confess with the publican, God be merciful to me a sinner. ”

“ In short; the doctrine of the cross, is suited to answer all the great ends of our ministry, and promote all the truly valuable interests of our people. By this, the holy Spirit delights to work. And this, O Satan, shall be thy plague: This O sin, shall be thy destruction, Hos. xii. 14. -However, therefore, the cross might be to the Jews a stumbling block, and to the Greeks foolishness; God forbid, that we should glory in any thing else - Let this be the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and ending [6] , of all our public ministrations. ”

“ And the sufferings of this present time, are not worthy to be compared with the happiness, which Christ has purchased with his agonies, and will quickly bestow on his people. —When death approaches; death, that cuts off the Spirit of Princes, and is terrible among the Kings of the earth: do you still glory in the cross. ”

“ John saw a bright assembly of happy beings, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands: rejoicing before the throne of God. These, said one of the venerable elders are they who came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne Rev. vii. 9, 14, 15.-They came out of great tribulation: They suffered, it is probable, in the service of Christ. Perhaps they laid down their lives for his sake. ”

“ It signifies a very high esteem, and a very tender benevolence. By a word of the same import, the Almighty Father expresses his infinite satisfaction, in the person and undertaking of his beloved Son; Matth. iii. 17. ↑ Would my reader have the liveliest paraphrase on this passage. Or see the actings of this divine complacency, described with inevitable delicacy? ”