5. But ye have not so learned the oracles of God. Ye know, that he who seeth what is in man, gives a far different account both of nature and grace, of our fall and our recovery. Ye know that the great end of religion is, to renew our hearts in the image of God, to repair that total loss of righteousness and true holiness, which we sustained by the sin of our first parent. Ye know that all religion which does not answer this end, all that stops short of this, the renewal of our soul in the image of God, after the likeness of him that created it, is no other than a poor farce, and a mere mockery of God, to the destruction of our own soul. O beware of all those teachers of lies, who would palm this upon you for Christianity! Regard them not, altho’ they should come unto you with _all the deceivableness of unrighteousness_, with all smoothness of language, all decency, yea beauty and elegance of expression, all professions of earnest good will to you, and reverence for the holy scriptures. Keep to the plain, old _faith, once delivered to the saints_, and delivered by the Spirit of God to our hearts. Know your disease! Know your cure! Ye were born in sin: therefore _ye must be born again_, born of God. By nature ye are wholly corrupted: by grace ye shall be wholly renewed. _In_ Adam ye _all died_: in the second _Adam, in_ Christ ye _all are made alive_. You _that are dead in sins hath he quickened_: he hath already given you a principle of life, even _faith in_ him _who loved_ you, and _gave himself for_ you! Now _go on from faith to faith_, until your whole sickness be healed, and all that _mind be in you, which was also in_ Christ Jesus! SERMON XLV. THE NEW BIRTH. JOHN iii. 7. _Ye must be born again._ 1. IF any doctrine within the whole compass of Christianity may be properly termed fundamental, they are doubtless these two, the doctrine of justification, and that of the new birth: the former relating to that great work, which God does _for us_, in forgiving our sins; the latter, to the great work, which God does _in us_, in renewing our fallen nature. In order of time, neither of these is before the other: in the moment we are justified by the grace of God, thro’ the redemption that is in Jesus, we are also _born of the Spirit_: but in order of thinking, as it is termed, justification precedes the new birth. We first conceive his wrath to be turned away, and then his Spirit to work in our hearts.