I do not, then, say that this transaction is called a covenant, as God’s dealing with Noah is, and His dealing with Abraham, with David, and with Phinehas; but it has these qualities, or this form of a covenant; the presence of distinct parties, considerations and purposes all settled, and the whole confirmed and acted on. And how does the spirit of a saint welcome the blessed truth of this great eternal transaction, engaging all the Godhead in the behalf of our souls!--as we read, among other passages, "elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ."⁷ ⁷ As intimating blessed and distinct actions among the Persons of the Godhead, according to covenant arrangements, we may remember Messiah’s words in Isa. xlviii.--"And now hath the Lord God and His Spirit sent me." What words! how full of deep, counselled, and ordered grace towards sinners! And they are quite according to the structure of things in the Gospels--for there not only does the baptism of Jesus but many passages tell us or show us, according to this word of the prophet, that the mission and ministry of the Lord Jesus were under the ordaining of God and the anointing of the Holy Ghost;--the Lord God and His Spirit sent the Son, the Christ or Messiah. But what strong foundations are these! what wondrous discoveries of grace! God Himself, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in counsel and in action for us! In the Gospel, man is in the place of _vision and audience only_. It is _God_ that is active. The activities and sacrifices are _God’s_, and the sinner has but to hear and live, to look and be saved. But these doings of God in the gospel of His grace, are the fruit (as we thus see) of precious and wondrous counsels, taken in Himself ere worlds were framed. And what, I ask, can surpass this? Can title or stability for a sinner, such as may allay all motion and uneasiness of conscience, be conceived beyond what he gets in this? Doings for him by God, and sacrifices made for him, and all this according to counsels ere worlds began! A sinner made happy (may I use this word?) at God’s expense!