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Effay V. art a ftranger, all the land of Canaan; for an everlasting possession. -Gen. xxii. 17. Thy feed fball poffefs the gate of his enemies.

Concerning the first or literal meaning of this promise, there can be no doubt as little can there be any doubt concerning its fulfilment to Abraham's natural feed, according to that meaning. After they had fojourned in Canaan and Egypt, God put Abraham's natural feed in poffeffion of the promised country by great miracles, and maintained them in the poffeffion of it during many ages.

But, like all the other promises in the covenant, this had a fecond and higher meaning, which Abraham and his immediate defcendants well understood; namely, that under the image of the poffeffion of Canaan, the poffeffion of a better country, even an heavenly, was promised to them; as the following arguments I think fufficiently prove.

1. Although, when God faid to Abraham, Gen. xii. 1. Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's boufe, unto a land that I will fhew thee, he might think of fome country on earth only, yet when God afterwards said to him, Gen. xvii. 1. I am the Almighty God, walk before me, and be thou perfect.-8. And I will give to thee, and to thy feed after thee, the land wherein thou art a ftranger, all the land of Canaan for an everlasting poffeffion; and I will be their God; he would naturally conclude that fome better country than any country on earth was promised to him, as the reward of his walking before God in a perfect manner. For the tranflation of his ancestor Enoch, from this earth in the body, after walking with God, muft have convinced him, that neither the poffeffion of Canaan, nor of any country on earth in its prefent ftate, is the proper reward of a perfect virtue. Befides, the whole earth being curfed for Adam's tranfgreffion, no part of it, as Abraham well knew, could be an everlasting habitation to him. In fhort, Abraham must have feen, that if the poffeffion of Canaan, during the whole of his life, was all that God promised to him as the reward of his walking before him in a perfect manner, he would not be rewarded more than other men; many of whom, notwithstanding ́ they were great finners, he observed, were enjoying the felicity of earthly countries in the greatest perfection.

2. The poffeffion of Canaan, promised in the covenant, being termed an everlasting poffeffion, if nothing was meant thereby, but the everlasting poffeffion of the earthly country fo called, Abraham, to whom it was promised, must have expected to live in that country for ever. The fame expectation, Ifaac and Jacob, his immediate defcendants, muft have entertained, to whom, as well as to him, the everlafting poffeffion of Canaan was promised. But if Abraham and all his pofterity were to live in the earthly Canaan without dying, he would foon be fenfible that it was a country too ftrait for containing all his feed.-Again, if that circumftance led him to interpret the promise concerning the everlasting poffeffion of Canaan, of its being poffeffed for a long feries of years, by the fucceffive generations of his pofterity, yet when he confidered that the poffeffion of Canaan was promifed to all his feed, to his feed by faith as well as to his natural feed, he would foon relinquish that interpretation; because it could not enter into his mind, to think that believers of all nations, who were on the earth in any one age, could live with his natural feed in fo narrow a country as Canaan. Or if such a thing had been poffible, he must have known, that to be tranfported into Canaan, would have been no advantage, but rather a lofs to many of them; fince the countries in which they were living, were better in every respect than Canaan. These reafons, I think, must have convinced Abraham, that a better and greater country then Canaan was promised in the covenant to him and to his feed, even an heavenly country, which was capable of containing all his feed, and of which the earthly country promised to his natural feed, was only the emblem and pledge.

3. Suppofing that Abraham thought Canaan was the only country promifed to him and to his feed, if any of them died without receiving that country, he muft have expected either that God would raise them from the dead to enjoy it, or that he would give them in the other world, a country equal to, or better than Canaan. For a perfon of Abraham's exalted faith and piety, never could think God capable of breaking his promife. Accordingly, our Lord, in reasoning with the Sadducees, affirmed, that the promise to give to Abraham and to his immediate defcendants the everlasting poffeffion of Canaan, was vir

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tually a promise to raise them from the dead. Luke xx. 37. Now that the dead are raised, even Mofes fhewed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord, the God of Abraham, and the God of Ifaac, and the God of Jacob; for he is not a God of the dead, but of the living. When Mofes at the bush, called the Lord, the God of Abraham and of his immediate defcendants, he brought to the remembrance of the Ifraelites, the memorable words with which the promise, to give to their fathers perfonally, the everlasting posfeffion of the land of Canaan, was concluded, namely, And I will be their God, Gen. xvii. 8. From these words our Lord reasoned against the Sadducees, who denied the refurrection of the dead, in the following manner: Seeing the Lord, when he promised to give to Abraham and to his feed, the land of Canaan for an everlasting poffeffion, added, And I will be their God, if Abraham and his immediate defcendants died without receiving Canaan, and are not to be raised from the dead to poffefs it, the Lord who promised it to them, could not with truth call himself their God, fo many years after they were dead. Or, as the apostle infinuates, Heb. xi. 16. he might have been ashamed to call himself their God.-Befides, in the preceding part of his difcourfe, our Lord termed the promised country, That world, in contradiction to This world; and declared, that to enjoy that world, Abraham and his feed must be raised from the dead. Luke xx. 34. The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage. But they who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the refurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage. 35. Neither can they die any more, for they are equal to the angels, and are the children of God, being the children of the refurrection. Wherefore, our Lord himself hath authorised us to believe, that in the promise to give to Abraham and to his feed, the land of Canaan for an everlasting poffeffion, a new. world, and a refurrection from the dead, in order to their enjoying that world, was really promised fo them; for which reafon he charged the Sadducees, who denied the refurrection, with ignorance of the fcriptures. Matth. xxii. 29. Te do err, not knowing the fcriptures.

4. St. Paul exprefsly affirms, that Abraham and his immediate defcendants, knew that in the promise to give to him and to them, the land of Canaan for an everlasting poffeffion, a better

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country, even an heavenly country, was promised to them. For he tells us, these men, to fhew that they expected a city whofe builder and ruler is God, never built any house or fixed habitation in Canaan, but always dwelled there in tents. Heb. xi. 9. By faith he fojourned in the land of promife, as belonging to others, dwelling in tents with Ifaac and facob, the joint heirs of the fame promife. 10. For he expected a city having foundations, of which city the builder and ruler is God.-Farther, the fame apostle informs us, that Abraham, and Ifaac, and Jacob, though they never obtained the poffeflion of Canaan, all died in the firm perfuasion of obtaining it. Heb. xi. 13. All thefe died in faith, though they did not receive the things promifed. For feeing them afar off, and being perfuaded of them, and embracing them, they confeffed that they were ftrangers and pilgrims on the earth. 14. Now they who speak fuch things, plainly declare, that they earnestly feek, warpida, a native country, not Chaldea. 15. For if they had remembered that from which they came out, they might have had opportu nity to have returned. 16. But indeed they frongly defired a better country, even an heavenly. After thefe exprefs teftimonies, can any one fufpect that Abraham and his immediate defcendants, did not know an heavenly country was promised to them in the covenant, under the image of Canaan; and that they were to be raised from the dead, in order to their enjoying it?

5. That the promise to give to Abraham and to his feed, the everlasting poffeffion of Canaan, was a promise to give them the everlasting poffeffion of an heavenly country, and to raise them from the dead to enjoy that country; and that Abraham and his defcendants understood the promise no otherwise, is evident from this, that the Ifraelites from the earliest times, entertained a ftrong hope of the refurrection of the dead, founded on the covenant with Abraham. Thus the Pfalmift, fpeaking of the wicked, faith, Pfal. xlix. 14. Like sheep they are laid in the grave, -and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning: Their beauty fhall confume in the grave from their dwelling. 15. But God will redeem my foul from the power of the grave: for he shall receive me.-Wisdom of Solomon iii. 4. Though they be punished in the fight of men, yet is their hope full of immortality.

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What a strong belief of the refurrection of the juft, and of the retributions of an after life founded on the covenant with Abraham, the later Jews entertained, we learn from the history of the feven brethren with their mother, who were put to death by Antiochus for refusing to tafte fwine's flesh, 2 Mac. vii. 9. The second, When he was at the last gasp, faid, Thou like a fury takeft us out of this prefent life; but the king of the world fhall raise us up, who have died for his laws, to everlafling life.-And that they expected this refurrection to everlasting life, by virtue of the covenant with Abraham, appears from the words of the youngest of these brethren: ver. 36. For our brethren who now have fuffered a fort pain, are dead under God's covenant of everlast ing life for what covenant of everlasting life did God ever make with the Jews, under which they could die, unless it be the covenant with Abraham, in which he promised with an oath, to give to him and to his feed, the land of Canaan for an everlasting poffeffion.

Farther, that the Jews derived their hope of the refurrection, from the covenant with Abraham, may be gathered from their expecting the refurrection of the juft only. Thus our Lord, fpeaking of the refurrection, according to the opinion which the Jews entertained of it, calls it, Luke xiv. 14. The refurrection of the juft. In like manner, the fourth of the seven brethren mentioned above, faid to his perfecutor, 2 Mac. vii. 14. As for thee, thou shalt have no refurrection to life. So alfo Jofephus, speaking of the opinion of the Pharifees, fays, Antiq. xviii. 2. "They be"lieve that there are To xov dina wosis, retributions under the "earth to fuch as have attached themselves to virtue, or vice "in this life; and that the one are condemned to perpetual "imprisonment, but that the other have an easy return to life.” -To this notion of the refurrection, the Jews were naturally led by the covenant with Abraham, in which the everlasting poffeffion of Canaan, in its fecond and highest meaning, was promised to the spiritual feed only; that is, to believers of all nations, who in the covenant are counted to Abraham for feed.

That the Jews, from the earliest times, expected the refurrection of the dead, and derived their hope of that great event from the covenant with Abraham, is attefted in the most exprefs

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