ing Providence to adopt means of seeking Divine favour which God
should bless. He was brought from the dream of desire to the reality of
enjoyment; from the state of one in darkness, groping his way, to the
light to which, by his own efforts, he could not have come; from the
paralysis of moral imbecility to the strength which enabled him to
stretch out his hand and take hold on God's Covenant.

Or, when the people of God may direct their faces to the work of
renewing their covenant engagements with him, some who might formerly
have been far from God may be led to the use of preparatory means, and,
when the time of Covenanting arrives, find themselves, for the first,
gifted with strength to pledge themselves to his service, and thereafter
feel themselves associated by ties indissoluble to his people, and
blessed with the covenant heritage of those who fear his name.

Such are not mere suppositions. They are consistent with the ordinary
procedure of God in extending grace to those who wait upon his
ordinances, however unworthy they may have been before. They are in
harmony with the spirit of the expression _to take hold_ upon the
Covenant of God--which obviously implies, according to the state of
those to whom it is applied, one or other of two things:--to engage to
the service of the Lord by covenant; or to renew such an engagement; and
are warranted by such statements as the exhortation, "Come and let us
join ourselves to the Lord in an everlasting covenant, never to be
forgotten." Such an address may be made either to the wicked or to the
righteous.--To the wicked, that they may, with their whole heart and
soul, depart from the evil of their doings, and give themselves to the
Lord; to the righteous, that they may so give themselves again; to the
wicked, that they may prepare their hearts to seek God--but not by any
effort of their own in a legal spirit, to commend themselves to him, and
then to enter into his covenant; and to all, that in a becoming frame of
mind they may take hold upon it. Whether or not many are brought to God
in such circumstances it may not be easy to decide; yet it cannot be
affirmed that none in this manner are joined unto him. To engage in the
exercise of Covenanting with the hope of being converted, is to act
under a misapprehension of its design; but who can say that God does
not, when this is practised, bring to himself? None could have any
encouragement to perform the service, were they sati