ds us
to imitate, are undoubtedly obligatory. Such are the moral examples of
God, Christ, apostles, prophets, saints, and churches, recorded in
Scripture, with command to follow them, Eph. iv. 32, and v. 1, 2; 1 John
ii. 6; 1 Cor. xi. 1; Phil. iv. 6; Heb. vi. 12, and xiii. 7; James v. 10;
3 John 11.

2. Those examples in Scripture, which the Spirit of Christ commends and
praises, are obligatory; his commendings are virtual commandings; and we
ought to follow whatsoever is praiseworthy, especially in God's account,
Phil. iv. 8, 9; 2 Cor. x. 18. Now the Spirit of Christ commends many
examples to us: as, _Enoch's walking with God_, Gen. v. 24; _Noah's
uprightness,_ Gen. vi.; _Abraham's faith_, Rom. iv., _and obedience_,
Gen. xxii.; _Lot's zeal against Sodom's sins_, 2 Pet. ii. 9; _Job's
patience_, James v. 10, 11. And in a word, all the examples of the
saints, which the Lord approves and speaks well of; as Heb. xi.; 1 Pet.
iii. 5, 6: together with all such examples, whose imitation by others is
commended in Scripture; as, 1 Thess. i. 6, 7, and ii. 14.

3. Those examples in Scripture are obligatory, whose ground, reason,
scope, or end, are obligatory, and of a moral nature, and as much
concern one Christian as another, one church as another, one time as
another, &c., whether they be the examples under the Old or New
Testament. Thus the example of the church of Corinth, in excommunicating
the incestuous person, because he was a wicked person--and lest he
should _leaven the whole lump;_ and that they might keep the
evangelical passover sincerely, and for that they had power _to judge
them within_; and that his "flesh might be destroyed, and his spirit
saved in the day of the Lord Jesus," 1 Cor. v. 5-8, 11-13: which grounds
and ends being moral, oblige us to use the like remedy against all
wicked and scandalous persons.

4. Those acts which are propounded in Scripture as patterns or examples,
that we should act the like good, or avoid the like ill, are an
obligatory law to us. There is an example of caution, and an example of
imitation.

Thus in reference to well-doing, or suffering for well-doing, the
examples of Christ, his apostles, and other saints, are propounded as
patterns to write after, as John xiii. 14, 15; Heb. xi. tot. with Heb.
xii. 1, _with such a cloud of witnesses_. This verse is as the epilogue
of the former chapter, (saith the learned Calvin,) showing to what end
the catalogue of saints was reckoned up,