Now for the fruits. Old or young, poor or rich, sick or well, in the cradle or on the death-bed, all who taste them, when every thing else is cloying and unsavory, the fruits are pleasant and go down sweetly, and they are both new and old. The first account we have of these new and old fruits is dropped by Moses. God promises his blessing on the sixth year, which shall be sufficient to carry them on beyond the harvest of the eighth, even unto the ninth year. All this store is promised to precede and succeed the jubilee year.
Strong meat are for men of full age, as milk is for babes.
These are laid up for thee, O my beloved. Such souls are the beloved of Christ, and he hath given ample proof of it, by his undertaking and going forth in our behalf from everlasting, by his sufferings for us in time, by preserving us when children of wrath, by manifesting himself to us when we were enemies, in suffering our manners so long in this wilderness, in pardoning of us from first to last, in delivering us out of troubles, in healing our backslidings, which have been many, in chiding us for what is amiss, and receiving us again when humbled, in destroying many that have hated us, in answering our prayers, in meeting us in his worship, in making us welcome at his table, in supplying all our wants, in favouring us with his presence, in revealing to us his mysteries, and giving us a good hope, through grace, of endless glory.