J. C. Philpot:
There is a peculiar people, then; and the desire of every heart that God has touched with His finger is sweetly breathed forth in the language of Ruth, when she said, "Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God" . Rut 1:16 "Yes", says the living soul whom God has quickened into a new and spiritual existence -"yes, they are the people of God; my heart cleaves to them with affection, I desire to be one with them; may my lot and portion be among the living family of God. Though there are in them many things which grieve me, though there are in them many divisions, though there is much lacking in them which I desire to see present, and much present in them which I desire to see absent, yet with all their failings and all their imperfections and all their infirmities, they are the people of the living God. With them I desire to live, and with them I desire to die."Then, friends, if you and I are walking in the strait and narrow path that leads to eternal life, we shall carry about with us some stamp, some evidence, that we belong to this peculiar people; we shall bear with us some marks that God has separated us, by a work of grace upon our souls, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth." Ex 33:16
But this people are a peculiar people in several points of view. They are a peculiar people by the original separation of them in the eternal councils of the Three-one God. They were chosen in Christ before all worlds, that they might be a people in whom the Lord Jesus might eternally delight, and in whom He might eternally be glorified. Their fall in their first parent was foreseen and fore provided for. The Lamb of God was slain, in the mind of God the Father, before the foundation of the world, and they stood eternally one with Christ, justified in His glorious righteousness, holy in His spotless innocency, perfect in His perfection, and comely in His comeliness.
And thus this peculiar people were blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ, Eph 1:3 before time had an existence; before this world had a being; before the all- creative voice of God made the sun and stars shine in the skies; when eternity alone existed, and the Three-one God dwelt alone in sacred communion, without any one object of Their creative hand. This people had a being then in the mind of God; and in virtue of this original being, they are brought forth first in time (each according to the moment that God has foreordained) and then in God’s appointed season, are brought forth by the quickening operations of the Holy Ghost into a new and spiritual existence.
But how, as a matter of individual inquiry, shall we know that we belong to this peculiar people? Shall we turn over the leaves of our Bible, and read, Eph 1:1 or, Ro 8:1 and seeing there that God has an elect people, at once conclude that we belong to them? Shall we turn to the first epistle of John, and reading there The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin, therefore conclude that our iniquities are pardoned? Shall we cast our eyes on the text Who is he that condemneth? it is God that justifieth; - and by reading that text of Scripture, without further ado, believe in our own personal justification? No; this may do for a dry professor, for one dead in a form; but it will never do for a living soul, whose conscience God has touched with His own finger. Before he can realize his interest in those blessings, wherewith God has blessed His people before all worlds, he must have a personal manifestation and revelation of those blessings to his own soul, under the operations of the Holy Spirit; and if they are not sealed upon his conscience, and evidenced to his heart, by the witness of the Holy Ghost, he can never be satisfied that he is a sharer in those blessings that are stored up for the elect in Christ Jesus.
Preached on Lord’s Day Evening, 11th July, 1841, at Zoar Chapel, Great Alie Street, London.
A Peculiar People 
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