SERM O N LXV. SERMON XLIV. MATT. xiii. 31, 32. The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard feed, which a man took and fowed in his field: which indeed is the least of all feeds; but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches of it. HIS elegant fimilitude, addressed by our TH Saviour to the multitudes who followed him to the fea of Tiberias, contains a moft lively description of the first rise, and amazing fubfequent progrefs of the Gospel, which is here called the kingdom of heaven. Planted VOL. III. B in in an unfriendly foil by an obfcure Galilean, and cultivated under every poffible disadvantage by the hands of a few illiterate fishermen and mechanics, it might well feem to resemble the smallest and most unpromising of all feeds: but notwithstanding this unfavourable appearance, fupported by its own natural strength, and refreshed by the dews from heaven, it foon fprang up into a great and flourishing tree; fo that the fowls of the air, that is, the various nations of the world, were able to find fhelter and protection under its wide and umbrageous branches. And if we examine the ftate of the Gospel in its feveral fucceffive ftages, we shall find that it will abundantly justify the description here given. Let us begin with the infant state of this great scheme of a new fyftem of religious truths, and fee what was its first introduction into the world. And here what a melancholy and unpromising scene prefents itself to our view! One might have expected, that a plan formed by the hand of God himself, fhould have opened with fome figual difplay of his divine divine power; fhould have contained fomething in its first appearance fuited to the majesty of its divine Author, and which might ftrike refiftlefs conviction into the hearts of those to whom it was propofed. But, instead of this, an obfcure Jew, whofe name was John, commiffioned indeed by God himself, but whose commiffion was known only to his own family and neighbours, takes upon himfelf the office of a divine herald, and proclaims to his countrymen the approach of that Meffiah, who had been fo long promised to their fathers. And what opinion were a blind and superstitious people likely to entertain of fuch a harbinger as this! His life indeed was holy, and his manners were strict and exemplary: but his appearance was mean, and unaccompanied with any difplay of divine power and greatnefs. He proclaimed indeed to them the coming of that Meffiah, whom they had so long and impatiently waited for to deliver them from the burden of the Roman yoke, under which they groaned: but then the Deliverer he pointed out to them was a perfon of obscure parentage, and unattended with any marks of regal greatness or divine authority and what was worst of all, he also told |