Covenanter

“ Communion with God is the secret of power, and of spiritual vision; and faithfulness in God's Covenant is the secret of Divine communion. The possibility of living in holy familiarity with God the Father, and with our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the Holy Spirit, learning the thoughts of God, feeling the thrill of His power, viewing His far-reaching plans, and co-operating in His glorious work—is this only a fascinating dream? Nay, the Covenanters of the martyr-spirit found it to be a realization. ”

“ The Church was the habitation of the Holy Spirit. The Covenant was the marriage bond joining her to her Lord and Husband. The love of the Covenanters for the Church of the Lord Jesus arose in flames of jealousy when they saw a mere man, a dissolute and sinful man, attempt to woo her heart and alienate her affections from her Lord and King. They could not endure it. Her honor and purity were worth more to them than life itself. ”

“ How different with him who will not surrender a hairbreadth of truth! He is the broad man; broad as the law of God, broad as the Gospel of Christ, broad as the principles of the everlasting Covenant, broad as the kingdom of heaven. Those Covenanters were the broadest men of their day.
The Covenanters would not receive Gospel services from ministers who had broken Covenant with them and with God. Sixteen years this flock was in the wilderness without a shepherd. They came together in societies for spiritual fellowship and the worship of God. ”

“ How with the 100,000 Covenanters while suffering in their homes, or roaming through the mountains, or hiding in the caves? We have a record of a few only, but we are persuaded that many others enjoyed an equal portion of the abounding love of Christ. The promise of God is ever sure: "As thy days, so shall thy strength be." Terrible days insure extraordinary strength. The Lord had a great harvest in those times, ministers and people, men and women, parents and children—a generation of honored worthies. ”

“ The world needs the truth that will rend the heavens with prayer, and make the earth quake with fear.
THE HIGHEST TYPE OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.
The standard of religion adopted by the Covenanted Church demands that Covenanters possess the noblest spirit. They, who rally in earnest under this banner, will be men after God's own heart. Such were the martyrs: kind, patient, self-sacrificing, passionately in love with Christ, and laboring diligently to bring others into the same sphere of blessedness. ”

“ They were filled with the spirit of the Saviour's prayer, "That they all may be one." In the present times, those who publicly contend for the reunion of a "few scattered fragments" of the Reformed Church are belauded as men of large hearts and liberal aims. The Covenanters embodied in their Solemn League and Covenant an engagement to "bring the Churches of God in the three kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity;" and they also subsequently included the Churches on the Continent in their efforts for ecclesiastical union. ”

“ Seeing the king is now upon the renewing of the covenants, it should be remembered that we enter into covenant, according to our profession therein, with reality, sincerity, and constancy, which are the qualifications of good covenanters. Many doubt of your reality in the covenant, let your sincerity and reality be evidenced by your stedfastness and constancy; for many have begun well, but have not been constant. ”

“ True Christians must, as they ponder these productions, be convinced that the Covenanters were men of intense faith and seraphic fervour, and their own hearts will burn as they catch the heavenly flame. Members of the Church of Christ will be stirred to nobler efforts for the Kingdom of their Lord as they meditate on the heroism of those who were the "chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof;" ”

“ For they had returned to [176] their respective trades after the day of the covenanting, and had only been out at Hepburn's raid, as the ploy with the Irvine men was called in jocularity, in order that the neighbours, who venerated their grandfather, might see them together as Covenanters. ”

“ Sharing ardently the royalist sympathies of his father, he, while Lord Ogilvy, took a very active part on behalf of Charles I during the Scottish wars. In 1640 he held Airlie Castle against Montrose, then a covenanter; but, being obliged to surrender, he was permitted, with his wife, to escape, an incident for which Montrose was sharply challenged by the tables (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1640, p. 53) . Refusing to obey the order of the Scottish parliament to appear before them and give caution for keeping the peace, Ogilvy was declared a rebel, and was specially exempted from pardon. ”

“ One month later, a fresh attempt by the king and his counselors to trample the heaven-given right to worship God with a free conscience stirred the country. The Covenanters were alert, they were not caught napping. They concentrated their strength upon the Capital once more, and this time with a speed that surprised the government. Their number was greater than before; hundreds of ministers, and hundreds of noblemen, with strong delegations of elders from many congregations assembled for the occasion. The vast concourse of people was too unwieldy to meet in one place ”

“ Say unto God, Lord, Thou hast sworn to take away my heart of stone, and to give me a heart of flesh, Thou hast sworn to write Thy law in my heart, Thou hast sworn to circumcise my heart, Thou hast sworn to give me Christ, to be my king, priest and prophet. And God cannot but be a covenant-keeper. By virtue of this covenant, God cannot but accept of a poor penitent sinner, laying hold upon Christ for pardon. In a word, we may challenge pardon and heaven by our covenant. God is not only merciful but just to forgive us; we may challenge heaven through Christ, out of justice. ”

“ O Lord I desire to close all by giving myself up to thee, and all mine; accept, Lord Jesus Christ, and help to perform, and own me as thy covenanted child, protesting humbly,that failing on my part (against which I resolve, as thou knowest) shall not make void this covenant, I having accepted of thy offer, upon thy own terms, and will henceforth wait for what is good, that when thou comest I may rejoice in thee, crying, this is my God and I have waited for him, as witness my hand at Blackness castle December, 1687. ”

“ Now Lord, I desire to enter in covenant with thee this day, in opposition to all the corruptions of a body of sin, that I am mastered with: I desire in thy fight to protest against all things in me or my family, that is not like thee, and this day to invite thee back to my house on any terms, and do not break us with thy long absence. Come Lord Jesus and take up thy dwelling amongst us; we are a heartless company without thee, come to the heads, and tell us what is our duty, and put work in our hands, art thou passing by us as one that has no more work ado for us. ”

“ The Covenant with God, when kept, produces holiness, tenderness, charitableness, and divinest sympathy; turns life into an overflowing fountain of goodness. They, who follow the Banner of the Covenant in spirit and in truth, will aim at the very climax of Christian character, moral culture, and heroic service through Jesus Christ. ”

“ Because that a covenant is the greatest obligation and the most forcible claim that can be invented to tie us to obedience and service. God may justly challenge obedience without covenanting, by virtue of creation, preservation and redemption: He hath made us, and, when lost, He hath purchased us with His blood. But being willing more abundantly to manifest His love, that we be the more fastened to Him, He hath tied Himself to us, and us to Him, by the strong bond of a covenant: as if God should say, Oh ye sons of men! ”

“ MAIN OUTGROWTHS It would seem clear that the primal idea of a covenant union between two persons, and between those persons and their God, was found in the initial and primitive rite of marriage, with its outpoured blood, or gift of life, on the threshold of being; and that this rite contained in itself the germs of covenanting and of sacrifice, and the idea of an altar and a sacrament, where, and by which, man and God were brought into loving communion and union. ”

“ Those indeed who are born in the covenant, if they are cut off by death so that they cannot be baptized, we number among those to be saved, and that because of the covenant promise which was made alike to parents and children. But the others, since not less than their parents they have no lot in the covenant, and are aliens from the promises of grace, we leave to the MERITED judgement of God. ”

“ O come and give thy consent to this covenant and bargain this day: let thy presence shew thy satissaction in it, that I may win to the faith—that not only I have covenanted with thee, but that thou hast condesended in thy. people that had jeoparded their lives in the high places of the fields taking chearfully the spoiling of their goods;—these are they that have buried the work of the Lord sadened the hearts of their poor affliction brethren buried the Covenant and the Reformaation work, which was the glory of our land. ”

“ How important the exercise of following the Divine example in Covenanting! It gives a peculiar elevation to the mind. We are called to duty for the advancement of God's glory, and for our own advantage. And when we contemplate aright the exercise as sanctioned by the procedure of God, how distinctly are these brought before us! Was it not for the advantage of men that God entered into covenant from the days of eternity? ”

“ And there, on the top of the mountain where the glory of the Lord shines like the sun in his strength, the three kingdoms, Scotland, England, and Ireland, enter into THE SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT.
We would appreciate our Covenanted privileges more highly, if we considered more carefully the difficulties our ancestors overcame in reaching the Covenant heights. Let us take heed lest, like a foolish heir squandering his father's wealth, we waste our inheritance, which is more precious than gold, more priceless than life. ”

“ Now, if your leases and covenants among men be either lame or forfeited; need men persuade you to have them renewed and perfected? Of how much greater concernment is this, between God and us, O! ye of little faith? 4. You receive the sacrament of the Lord's supper once a month, and some will not be kept off, tho' they have no part, nor portion in that mystery, say the ministers of Christ what they can; and the sacrament is but the seal of the covenant ”

“ The covenant you have made is a righteous covenant. Because of the change made in your hearts through faith in His name, and because of the covenant you have made, you will be called The Children of Christ, for today you have been spiritually born of Him, and have become His sons and daughters. ”

“ Of the covenant which we made in baptism, and renew every time we come to the Lord's supper, and upon our solemn days of fasting. There are none here, but I may say of them, "the vows of God are upon you." You are servi nati, empti, jurati, you are the born, bought, and sworn servants of God, you have made a surrender of yourselves unto God and Christ. The question I put to you is this: How often have you broken covenant with God? It is said, "The sinners in Zion are afraid; who shall dwell with everlasting torments? Who shall dwell with devouring fire?" ”

“ Thanks, all thanks to our new covenant Head for the stability of the covenant; we change, but he changeth not. He himself is the covenant given to the people, and because he lives, his people shall live also, in spite of Satan and his colleague sin in our hearts: sin may, and does bring his people into captivity, but it shall not keep them in bondage for ever. The time of deliverance shall come, when they shall revive as the corn. ”

“ We acknowledge the covenant under which we live; we believe it, and are honest in our believe [belief] ; and we will honor that covenant by obedience to the laws of God. If we do not, our words and our actions contradict each other. By our acts, by our coming together, by our leaving our homes, our friends and our birthplaces that were dear to us according to the customs and belief of the world, we have declared our desire to serve the Lord. ”

“ When he hath respect to the covenant, he
hath hath respect to his Spirit, the great applier of the covenant blessings, and executor of the Testament, sealed with the blood of Christ, and by whom covenant-love is shed abroad upon the heart, Rom. v. 5. Why then the strength of the plea is, 'have respect to the covenant;' that is, have respect to thy own Spirit, that he may get the glory of applying by his power, what Christ hath purchased by his blood. ”

“ What the former dispensations announced as to come, this concluding dispensation has exhibited in actual accomplishment. The long-expected Redeemer has been manifested; he has made the promised atonement for the sins of mankind; he has{177} shewn himself as the mediator of the new covenant, and the doubts of ages have vanished before the light of the Gospel.”
I ventured to interrupt my uncle, to ask why it is called the new covenant, as if it was of a different nature from the two former ones. ”

“ Where any are the people of God, there there is blessedness indeed, for they have His truth for their security, they have His love for their comfort, His power for their defence. The Lord God, He takes His people into His bosom, and with every soul He does so, and says, "I the Lord thy God enters in covenant with thee, and renews the covenant that before I made with thee." ”