A Complete Body of Divinity
5. The sacrifice of Christ was fragrant and efficacious, because of the great glory and honor which he thereby brought unto God. The glory of his Father was what he had in view, as his main scope and aim in all his actions and sufferings, and that which he also actually perfected. The glory of all the divine attributes appeared in him in its highest luster, 2 Corinthians 4:6. They all centered in him, and shone forth in their greatest splendor, not only in his incarnation, but also and chiefly in his sacrifice. The mercy and justice of God appear in combination here, and set off one another's luster. Mercy could not be glorified, unless justice had been satisfied; and justice had not been evidently discovered, if the tokens of divine wrath had not been seen upon Christ. Grace had never sailed to us, but in the streams of the Mediator's blood. 'Without the shedding of blood (says the apostle) there is no remission.' Divine justice had not been so fully known in the eternal groans and shrieks of a world of guilty creatures, nor could sin have appeared so odious to the holiness of God by eternal scars upon devils and men, as by a deluge of blood from the heart of this sacrifice. Without the sufferings of Christ, the glory of the divine perfections had lain in the cabinet of the divine nature without the discovery of their full beams. And though they were active in the designing of it, yet they had not been declared to men or angels, without the bringing of Christ to the altar. By the stroke upon his soul, all the glories of God flashed out to the view of the creature. All the divine perfections were glorified in the sufferings of Christ; his mercy, justice, power, and wisdom. Here the unsearchable depths of manifold wisdom were unfolded. Such a wisdom of God shined in the cross, as the angels never beheld in his face upon his throne; wisdom to cure a desperate disease, by the death of the physician; to turn the greatest evil to the greatest good; to bring forth mercy by the execution of justice, and the shedding of blood: how surprising and astonishing is this! The ultimate end and design of Christ's sacrifice was the honor of God in our redemption. Christ sought not his own glory, but the glory of him that sent him, John 8:50. He sought the glory of his Father in the salvation of men. Now, that must needs be fragrant and acceptable to God which accomplished the triumph of all his attributes.
Question: But did not those sacrifices which were in use under the law satisfy the justice of God, and take away the sins of the people?
To this I answer in the negative. These sacrifices were but shadows by their institution, and were to have their accomplishment in some other, and therefore could make nothing perfect. See what the apostle Paul says, who was once very zealous for them, Hebrews 10:1, 4, 11. 'For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never, with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually, make the comers thereunto perfect. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. And every priest stands daily ministering, and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.' More particularly,
1. It was against common reason, that the sin of a soul should be expiated by the blood of a beast; that the sufferings of a nature so far inferior could be a sufficient compensation for the crime of a nature so much superior to it. The prophet spoke the true reason of mankind when he asserted, that the Lord would not be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil; that he would not accept of the first-born of the body as a satisfaction for the sin of the soul, Micah 6:6. A rational sacrifice was only fit to atone for the sin of a rational being. There was no agreement between the nature of a man and that of a bullock. The nature that sinned was also to suffer, and so to bear the punishment due by the law. 'The soul that sins it shall die,' says the Lord, Ezekiel 18:4. If God had been content with the blood of beasts for the sins of men, then there had been no sufficient discovery of the severity of his justice, the purity of his holiness, nor the grandeur of his grace. It was inconsistent with the honor and majesty of God, who had denounced a terrible curse upon all the transgressors of the law, and published it with so much dread and awful solemnity, as thunders and lightnings, fire and smoke, and terrible earthquakes, to make so light of it, as to accept of the blood of a few mangled beasts, in the room of the offender. Would God appear upon mount Sinai with ten thousands of his angels to publish a fiery law, and let all the threatenings of it vanish into smoke? Can any in reason think, that all those fearful curses should be poured out upon a few irrational and innocent creatures, who had never broken that law? Can it ever enter into the heart of man to think, that, after so solemn and terrible a proclamation, he would acquiesce in so slight a compensation as the death of a poor beast? None can possibly entertain so mean and despicable thoughts of the infinite majesty, justice and holiness of God, or of the vile and detestable nature of sin, and the greatness of its provocation, as to imagine that the one could be contented, or the other expiated, by the blood of a lamb or a bullock. Our own consciences will tell us, that if God will have a sacrifice, it must be proportioned to the majesty of him whom they have offended, and to the greatness of the crime which they have committed. If all the cattle upon a thousand hills were sacrificed, and all the cedars in Lebanon were cut down for wood to burn the offering, it could not be a sweet smelling savor to God. There is an infinite disproportion between this kind of sacrifice and the glorious Majesty of Heaven.
2. The repetition of those sacrifices shows their insufficiency for the expiation of sin. For where the conscience is once purged, and the remission of sin obtained, there is no more offering for sin, as the apostle tells us, Hebrews 10:18. But the repeating of the sacrifice plainly intimates, that the person for whose sake it is repeated is in the same condition now that he was in at the time of the former oblation. The apostle tells us, that if the law could have made men perfect, then these sacrifices would have ceased to be offered, because that the worshipers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins, but in those sacrifices there was a remembrance again made of sins every year, Hebrews 10:2, 3. Had the wrath of God been appeased by them, why should the fire burn perpetually upon the altar? why should it be so fed continually with the carcases of slain beasts? As often as they were offered, there was a conscience of sin excited in the presenter of them, and iniquity was called to remembrance. The whole scene of the legal administration loudly proclaimed, that the wrath of God against sin was not appeased and that the guilt of the soul was not wiped off. If a man had presented a sacrifice for his sin one day, and fallen into the same or some other sin before night, he most have repeated his sacrifice for a new expiation. Had there been any efficacy in them to purge away sin, then they had ceased; and there would have been no repetition of them.
3. The great variety of these sacrifices shows their insufficiency to take away sin. There were many gifts and sacrifices, bulls and goats, calves and lambs; which shows that no one thing was fit to typify and represent the full expiation wrought by Christ; whereas he offered but one sacrifice, and by that perfected forever them that are sanctified. As the application of many medicines shows their insufficiency to cure a disease, so the many sacrifices and purifications under the law, plainly evidence that a full and efficacious atoning sacrifice for sin was to be sought elsewhere. If the great annual sacrifice, which was the most solemn one in that whole institution could not effect it, much less could sacrifices of a lower dignity. It is from the repetition of this great sacrifice that the apostle argues the insufficiency of them all, Hebrews 10.
4. God never intended that these sacrifices should expiate sin by any virtue of their own. The great and glorious Majesty of Heaven, who was offended and provoked by sin, is truly infinite; and to satisfy him the sacrifices must be infinite too. But none of those sacrifices under the law were so. Why then were they appointed? Not with any intention to purge away the sin of the soul, but the ceremonial impurity of the flesh, as Hebrews 9:13, 14 where you see the blood of bulls and of goats sanctifies to the purifying of the flesh. The apostle compares these and the sacrifice of Christ together, and shows that the one purified only the flesh, and the other the conscience. It was not a moral guilt which they were intended to remove, but only a ceremonial one; as when one was defiled by touching a dead carcass or a leprous person, which was reckoned a defilement of the body, not of the soul. God has often discovered their weakness and insufficiency, and that they could not give him recompense for the injury done him by sin. So Isaiah 66:1. 'Thus says the Lord, the Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: where is the house that you build unto me? and where is the place of my rest?' By the house or temple here is meant all the Jewish economy, the whole lump of legal sacrifices. Though all these were appointed by God, and had been used by his people for a long time, yet he had no rest in them: they could neither satisfy his justice nor vindicate the honor of his law, nor could they ever take away sin, Hebrews 10:11. And therefore God rejected them, and they were abolished and disannulled, for the weakness and unprofitableness of them, Hebrews 7:18. Though they had been practiced by the Jews for so many ages, yet not one sin had been expiated by them in all that long tract of time.
5. The insufficiency of these sacrifices for the satisfaction of divine justice, and the expiation of sin, appears from the end and design of their institution, which was to prefigure and represent a more excellent sacrifice, that was able to do it effectually, even the great sacrifice of Christ. They were but shadows of good things to come, as the apostle terms them, and did typically represent a crucified dying Christ as the substance: and whatever virtue they had, it was not in or from themselves, but from their typical relation to him whom they prefigured. They all pointed forth the sacrifice of Christ, by whose precious blood, shed in the fullness of time, the sins of the elect were fully expiated. God had no pleasure in these sacrifices, but only so far as they represented the sacrifice of Christ, which effectually takes away sin, Hebrews 10:6, 7, 8.
From what has been said on this head, you see that those sacrifices which were in use under the law could not satisfy the justice of God, and take away the sins of men.
Objection If Christ suffered for the sins of his people, then he who was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners, must be accounted a guilty person, yes, even the most guilty of all others, as having charged upon him all the sins of an elect world.
Ans. There is a twofold guilt to be considered, namely, a culpable, and a penal guilt. He who commits the offence is under culpable guilt; and he who is obliged to suffer for the offence is under penal guilt, though he did not actually commit it. Now, Christ as our sacrifice was under this penal guilt; the offences committed by us were charged upon him; and by his voluntary undertaking to be a sacrifice for us, he came under an obligation to suffer for us, as if he had really sinned, though we only were the transgressors. This is plain in the case of those legal sacrifices, which were shadows of Christ. It appears from them, that these two sorts of guilt may be separated, so that he who is not culpably guilty may be penally guilty, and may justly suffer though he did not personally sin: for the sins of the people being laid upon these sacrifices, they were under penal guilt, and did justly suffer as if they had sinned; and yet they were not culpably guilty; for they neither had sinned, nor were they capable of sinning.
Question: Seeing Christ offered up his sacrifice to satisfy divine justice, and he himself is God, how could he die and make satisfaction to himself?
Ans. 1. God cannot be said properly to satisfy himself; for that would be the same thing as to pardon sin simply, without any satisfaction.
2. There is a twofold consideration of Christ, one in respect of his divine nature or essence, in which sense he is both the object against which the offence is committed, and to whom for it the satisfaction is made: and there is another consideration of Christ in respect of his person, and economy or office; in which sense he properly satisfied God, seeing he was, in respect of his manhood, another and inferior to God. So he says, John 14:28. 'My Father is greater than I.' The blood of the man Christ Jesus is the matter of the satisfaction; the divine nature dignifies it, and makes it of infinite value.
3. It is not inconsistent with reason, that the Son of God, clothed in our nature, should by his death make satisfaction to the Deity, and consequently to himself. For in the according of two different parties, a person that belongs to one of them may interpose for reconciliation, provided that he divests his own interest, and leaves it with the party from which he comes. As for instance, let us suppose two persons, a father and a son, both possessed of the supreme power, and offended by rebellious subjects: It is not inconsistent that the Son interpose as a Mediator to restore them to the favor of the prince his father. And by this he also reconciles them to himself, and procures pardon for that offence, by which his own majesty was wronged. Now, this is a fit illustration of the great work of our redemption, so far as human things can represent divine. For all the persons of the holy Trinity were equally provoked by our sin; and to obtain our pardon, the Son, with the consent of the Father, deposits his interests in his hands, and as a Mediator intervenes between us and his Father, who in this transaction is considered as the guardian of the rights of Heaven; and having performed what divine justice required, he reconciled the world to God, that is, to the Father, himself, and the eternal Spirit. In this case his person is the same, but his quality is different. He made satisfaction as a Mediator, and received it as God; which is no way inconsistent.
Question: Seeing Christ really suffered for the sins of his people, whether did he suffer the same punishment that they deserved, and which the law threatened, or only something equivalent to it? It would seem that Christ did not suffer the same thing that the law threatened, and which we justly deserved for sin: for then he must have suffered eternal death. It was not only the first, but the second death that the law threatened. Therefore Christ's temporal death did not satisfy the law and justice of God for us.
There are very learned and pious writers on both sides of this question. Yet I humbly think, that, without any inconvenience, both may be affirmed in different respects. To clear this, you would know, that the punishment which Christ endured in our stead may he considered either as to its substance or essence, or with respect to the accidental circumstances which attend it when inflicted on the damned. Now, if we consider it as to substance or essence, it was the very same which the sinner should have undergone. Man by his fall was liable to death, and to the curse and wrath of God, and Christ has borne this in the elect's room. But if we consider it with respect to the accidental circumstances which attend it when it is inflicted on the damned, then it was not the very same, but a punishment equivalent to it. The accidental circumstances of this punishment as inflicted on the damned, are, blasphemy, rage, and an impotent fierceness of mind, which are not appointed by the law, but are only accidentals, arising from the wickedness and perverseness of their spirits. Now, our blessed Savior was not, nor possibly could be, liable to these. The great holiness and sanctity of his person effectually secured him against all these. Besides, the punishment that is inflicted upon the damned is eternal, and attended with final despair, and the intolerable anguish of a guilty stinging conscience. This is the never-dying worm that gnaws upon their vitals. But Christ the Redeemer having no real guilt, was not liable to the worm of conscience; and his temporary sufferings were equivalent to the eternal punishment of the damned, and fully satisfactory to divine justice, on account of the infinite dignity and excellency of his person; so that he was not capable of despair.
Thus it evidently appears, that Christ offered himself a sacrifice to satisfy the justice of God offended by sin. And in order to confirm your faith in this important article, one of the fundamental doctrines of our holy religion, let me again call your attention to the following particulars, which I shall but barely mention.
1. Consider the necessity of this satisfaction. Without shedding of blood there is no remission, The justice of God, the nature of sin, and the sanction of the law necessarily required it. And the event manifests it; for it is not conceivable, how, if sin could have been taken away, with a bare word, the Lord would have fetched a compass by the blood of his own Son.
2. Consider the truth of it. Christ did really and truly, by the sacrifice of himself, satisfy the justice of God for us. For he bare the punishment due to our sins, Isaiah 53:5. He died for us, in our room and stead, Romans 5:6, 7; and not for our good only, which may be said of all the martyrs. Compare 1 Corinthians 1:13. He bought us with his blood and gave himself a ransom for our souls, and so has taken away our sins in the guilt thereof. His sufferings were the sufferings of a divine person; and so, though not infinite in duration, yet infinite in value. He was Lord of his own life.
3. Consider the perfection of it. He satisfied completely for the sins of the people. His satisfaction fully answered the demands of the justice and law of God. This is plain from the excellency of the person suffering, Col 1:19.: this the apostle testifies, Hebrews 10:14 forfeited; and from the discharge he got in his resurrection, and exaltation to the Father's right hand. Whatever is left to his people to suffer it is not to satisfy the justice of God, but for their correction, that they be made partakers of his holiness.
Having thus showed that one end for which Christ offered up himself a sacrifice to God, was to satisfy his justice, I proceed,
SECONDLY, To show that another end, as a native consequence of the other, was to reconcile elect sinners unto God. Here I shall,
1. Explain the nature of Christ's reconciliation.
2. Prove that reconciliation with God is the blessed fruit and effect of Christ's death.
2. Show what influence the death of Christ has on this.
First, As to the nature of reconciliation, several things are implied in it. As,
1. A former friendship and favor. God and man were once in good terms. There was a time wherein they met and lovingly conversed together. When Adam dropped from the fingers of his Creator, he was the friend and favorite of Heaven. He had the law of God written on his heart, and a strong bent and inclination in his will to obey it. In that state there was no place for reconciliation: for then there was no breach between God and his creature.
2. It implies an enmity between God and man. Man fell from his primitive state of favor and friendship with Heaven, and joined issue with the devil, God's greatest enemy. Whereupon the Lord took the forfeiture of his possession, turned him out of paradise, and hindered his re-entrance by a flaming sword. There is now a dreadful war between earth and Heaven. Men daily rebel against God's laws, laboring to beat down his interest in the world, and employing all their powers and faculties, mercies and comforts, as weapons of unrighteousness to fight against him. And he is all enemy to them; for he hates all the workers of iniquity, and the foolish cannot stand in his sight. His wisdom, holiness, justice, and power, stand ready charged against them, and they are liable to his eternal vengeance. This is the state wherein man stands with God on the account of sin.
3. Reconciliation with God lies in his receiving rebels into favor, and issuing forth a gracious act of indemnity for all their sins, and cancelling all those bands of guilt whereby they were bound over to eternal wrath and misery. This great blessing formally consists in his 'not imputing their trespasses unto them;' 2 Corinthians 5:19. The forfeiture is taken off, and they are admitted into his former friendship and favor. Now, this is twofold; fundamental and actual.—There was a foundation laid for this reconciliation in the death of Christ. This is the mean by which it was purchased, and the chief and only ground why God lays aside his anger. 'He made peace,' says the apostle, 'by the blood of his cross.' And it is actual, when the offer of reconciliation is complied with by faith. He sends forth his ambassadors, clothed with his authority, to pray them in Christ's stead to be reconciled to God, declaring his great willingness to receive them into favor; and when men embrace the offer of reconciliation, then God actually lays aside his anger, and imputes sin no more to them.
Secondly, I proceed to prove that it is only through Christ that sinners can obtain reconciliation with God. This is clear,
1. From the holy scriptures, where this great truth is expressly declared. So it is said, Acts 4:12. 'Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.' And we are elsewhere told, that 'there is but one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And he is called the Savior of the world, not only by way of excellency, in respect of the great danger he saves us from, but by way of exclusion also, in regard of the sole designation of his person to this office, exclusive of all others. 'If you believe not that I am he,' says he, 'you shall die in your sins,' John 8:24. He is the only person that was designed in all the prophecies, promises, and types. He is the only Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. He is the promised seed of the woman, that was to break the serpent's head. The heart of God is fixed upon him alone, and his resolution concerning the duration of his office is immutable and unalterable. He has summed up all the dispensations of former ages in him, Ephesians 1:10. All other things were preparations to and shadows of him; God, who had various ways of communicating himself to men, has summed up his whole will in his Son, and manifested and declared that all his transactions with men did terminate in him.
2. The truth of this doctrine will appear, that none else was ever fitted for the management of this work. God and men were to be reconciled, and none but he who was God and man in one person could be a fit day's man to lay his hand upon both. Had he been only man, he had been incapable to satisfy offended justice; and had he been only God, he had been incapable of suffering. But being God and man, he is fitted for both. Infinite satisfaction was requisite to appease the anger of God; for without this, guilt would have remained: and none else was capable to give it, but Christ, in regard of the infinite dignity and excellency of his person. It was upon no other person that the Spirit descended like a dove to furnish his human nature with all needful abilities for the discharge of his trust.
3. If we consider that none else ever did that for us which was necessary for our reconciliation with God. It was he who answered the demands of the law, and silenced the roaring of vindictive justice. He only filled up the gap that was between God and sinners. It was only Christ that interposed himself as a shelter between the wrath of God and the souls of men. The prophet Isaiah tells us, that 'he bare our griefs, and carried our sorrows, and that the chastisement of our peace was upon him.' He received into his own affections the sword of justice that was sharpened and pointed for us. He tred the wine-press alone, and none of the people were with him. He endured the bruises of God, the darts of the devil, and the reproaches of men; and would not desist until he had laid the foundation of an everlasting peace between God and sinners.
4. If you consider that none else was ever accepted of God but this Mediator. The legal sacrifices were not able to make the comers thereunto perfect, Hebrews 10:1. They were only shadows of good things to come; Christ was the substance and complement of them all; and they were no farther regarded of God but as they were types and representations of his Son. The daily repetition of them was an undeniable evidence of their inability to effect the reconciliation of man; but the blood of Christ typified by the blood sprinkled by Moses upon the people, does it effectually. This was a sacrifice wherein God smelt a sweet savor, and was highly accepted of him.
Thirdly, It remains to show you what Christ did in bringing about this reconciliation.
1. He undertook this work in the eternal transaction that was between the Father and him, as I have shown you formerly at large.
2. He purchased reconciliation by his death, and thereby procured the egress of the divine favor to man. This was the prime article in the covenant of grace, 'When you shall make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed,' Isaiah 53:10. God required this sacrifice exclusive of all others, which were entirely useless for the satisfaction of justice, though fit to prefigure the grand sacrifice that God intended. It was by the death of Christ alone that reconciliation was purchased to men, Romans 5:10. Ephesians 2:13 and Colossians 1:21. And when he was upon the cross he cried, 'It is finished;' that is, the work of redemption is accomplished, reconciliation is purchased, I have done all that was appointed for me to do, the articles on my part are now fulfilled, there remain no more deaths for me to suffer.
3. He brings about an actual reconciliation between God and sinners by virtue of his efficacious intercession, Hebrews 7:25. His advocacy in Heaven is the gracious spring of all divine communications. It is by this that he deals with God in the behalf of men; he leads every believer by the hand as it were unto the gracious presence of God, bespeaking acceptance for them after this manner: 'Father, here is a poor creature that was born in sin, and has lived in rebellion all his days; he has broken all your laws, and deserves all your wrath; yet he is one of that number that you gave me before the world began; and I have made full payment to your justice by my blood for all his debt; and now I have opened his eyes to see the sinfulness and misery of his condition: I have broken his heart for his rebellions against you and bowed his will into obedience to the offer of your grace: I have united him to me by faith, as a living member of my mystical body: and now, since he is mine by regeneration, let him also become your by a special acceptance: since your justice is satisfied for his sins, let your anger also be turned away, and receive him graciously into favor.' In a word, the reconciliation of every elect person with God, is actually brought about by Christ: He opens their eyes, and lets them see their sin and danger: he beats down the stubbornness and obstinacy of their wills, and brings up their hearts to a full compliance with the offers of peace made in the gospel; and he leads them to God, and makes their persons and duties acceptable to him. Hence it is said, Ephesians 1:6. 'He has made us accepted in the Beloved.
Before I proceed to the consideration of the second part of Christ's priestly office, namely, his intercession. I shall make some improvement of the doctrine of his satisfaction.
1. Here we may see the horrid and hateful evil of sin, which no other sacrifice could expiate but the blood of the Son of God. As the strength of a disease is known and seen by the quality and force of the medicine that is made use of to cure it, and the virtue of a commodity by the greatness of the price that it laid down to buy it; so is the matter here. The sufferings and death of Christ express the evil of sin far above the severest judgments that ever were inflicted upon any creature. The dying groans of our blessed Redeemer set forth the horrid nature of sin, and loudly proclaim how hateful it is in the eye of an infinitely pure and holy God. How much evil must there be in sin that made Christ to groan and bleed to death to take it away! It is strange to imagine how rational agents should dare to commit such an evil, so freely and openly, and that for trifles and perishing vanities, which are of no continuance and duration. Can they escape, or can they possibly endure, the wrath and vengeance of an incensed Deity? If God spared not his own Son, when he came in the likeness of sinful flesh, how shall sinners escape, who are deeply and universally defiled? Can they encounter with the fury of the Almighty, the very apprehensions of which made Christ's soul exceeding sorrowful even unto death? Have they patience to endure and bear that forever, which was intolerable for Christ to bear but for a few hours, who had all the strength of the Deity to support him? If it was so with the green tree, what shall become of the dry, when exposed to the fiery trial? O what prodigious madness is it for men to drink iniquity like water, as a harmless thing, when it is a poison so dangerous and deadly, that the least drop of it brings certain ruin? What desperate and monstrous fully is it to have slight apprehensions of that which is attended with the first and second death; even with all the terrors and torments of Hell, where the worm dies not, and the fire is not quenched; where misery will continue in its full extremity, while eternity runs its endless course! Nothing but unreasonable infidelity and want of thought can make men venturous to provoke the living God, who is infinitely sensible of their sins, and who both can and will most terribly punish them forever.
2. This lets us see the strictness and inexorable severity of divine justice, that required satisfaction equivalent to the desert of sin. All the other demonstrations of it which God has given to the world, are nothing to this. God spared not his own Son. The fountain of divine mercy stopped its course, and would not let out one drop to Christ in the day of his extreme sorrow and sufferings. The Father of mercies saw his dear Son sweating great drops of blood in a cold night, and crying out with a mournful accent, 'O Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me;' and yet he would not grant the request. O the inflexible severity of divine justice! What will you do, sinners, when it falls upon you in Hell? If the blessed Son of God cried so out, what will become of you? How will impenitent sinners roar and yell forever under the dreadful strokes of incensed justice! O what a dreadful thing must it be to fall into the hands of the living God!
3. See here the wonderful love of Christ to poor miserable sinners, and his great desire for the salvation of their souls. His love here passes knowledge. It infinitely transcends the reach of the most illuminated understanding. What Christ suffered from his birth to his death on the accursed tree, affords the most striking instance of his great love to poor sinners. No example of such love can be found among men. This matchless love of Christ should inflame our hearts to sing, as Revelation 1:5, 6. 'Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood; and has made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.'
4. This doctrine affords us the strongest assurance that can be, that God is willing to pardon our sins, and to be reconciled to us. There is in the natural conscience of man, when opened by a piercing conviction, such a quick sense of guilt, and of God's avenging justice, that it can never have an entire confidence in his mercy until justice be atoned. From hence the convinced sinner is restlessly inquisitive how to find out the way of reconciliation with a holy and righteous God. Thus he is represented inquiring by the prophet, 'With which shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?' The scripture tells us, that some consumed their children in the fire, to render their idols propitious to them: but all these means were ineffectual, their most costly sacrifices were only food for the fire; nay, instead of expiating their old sins, they committed new ones by them, and were so far from appeasing, that they inflamed the wrath of God by their cruel oblations. But in the gospel there is the most rational and easy way propounded for the satisfaction of divine justice, and the justification of man. Hence says the apostle, Romans 10:6, 7, 9. 'The righteousness which is of faith speaks on this wise, Say not in your heart, Who shall ascend into Heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above); or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead). If you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart, that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved.' The apostle here sets forth the care and anxiety of an awakened conscience. He is at a loss to find out a way to escape deserved judgment: for such things as are on the surface of the earth or floating on the waters are within our view, and may easily be obtained; but those which are above our understandings to discover, or our power to obtain, are proverbially said to be in the heavens above, or in the depths beneath; and it is applied here to the different ways of justification by the law and by the gospel. The law propounds life upon an impossible condition. But the gospel clearly reveals to as, that Christ has performed all that was necessary to our justification, and that by a true faith we shall have an interest in it. Christ's ascension into Heaven is a convincing proof, that the atoning sacrifice for our sins is perfect; for otherwise he had not been received into God's sanctuary, and admitted into the sacred place. Therefore to be under anxious and perplexing inquiries how we may be justified, is to deny the value of Christ's righteousness, and the truth of his ascension. By virtue of the sacrifice and righteousness of Christ, the soul is not only freed from the fear of God's wrath, but has a lively hope of his favor and love. This is expressed by the apostle, Hebrews 12:23 when he reckons among the privileges of believers, that they are come to God, etc. The apprehensions of God as the righteous Judge of the world, strike the guilty creature with dread and terror; but is sweetened by Christ the Mediator, we may approach unto him with a humble and holy confidence.
5. We must lay hold on this sacrifice, if we would be saved. This is the only sacrifice that satisfied offended justice, and no other could do it. Therefore we must have recourse to this, if we would have peace with God. Under the law the people were to be sprinkled with the blood of the sacrifice; and so must we be with the blood of Christ. It is said, Exodus. 24:8 that 'Moses took the blood of the covenant, and sprinkled it on the people.' This signified the sprinkling of their consciences with the blood of Christ, and their obtaining redemption, justification, and access to God, through it alone. Hence our Savior is described by this part of his office, Isaiah 52:15. 'He shall sprinkle many nations.' Our guilt cannot but look upon God as a consuming fire, without a propitiatory sacrifice. All our services are lame and defective, impure and imperfect, so that they will rather provoke God's justice, than merit his mercy. We must therefore have something to put a stop to a just fury, expiate an infinite guilt, and perfume our unsavory services, and render them acceptable to a holy and righteous God; and that is only the sacrifice of Christ. This is full of all necessary virtue to save us: but the blood of it must be sprinkled upon our souls by faith. Without this we shall remain in our sins, under the wrath of God, and exposed to the sword of divine justice; and our misery will be heightened by our having the offers of Christ and his grace. O! it is a fearful thing for men to have this sacrifice pleading against them, and this precious blood crying for vengeance from Heaven upon them; as innocent Abel's blood cried to Heaven for vengeance against the unnatural cruelty of his wicked and inhumane brother.
6. Hence see that God will never seek satisfaction for sin from those that are in Christ Jesus. He gave full and complete satisfaction to the law and justice of God for all the wrongs and injuries done thereto by the sins of men, the sufferer being God, and his divine nature stamping an infinite value upon them. Now, if the creditor receives full satisfaction for an offence done, or complete payment of a debt due, by a debtor, from the hands of a surety, neither law nor justice will permit him to ask any further satisfaction or payment from the principal debtor. He can raise no suit or action against the debtor, in regard he has fully satisfied him by the action and deed of his surety. Law and justice are fully satisfied by the obedience and satisfaction of Christ substituting himself in the room of sinners, and making his soul an offering for them, so as they can crave no more: therefore there can be no condemnation to those that are in him, and have taken the benefit of his satisfaction, and present it to God, as theirs, performed in their room and stead. Hence the apostle says, 'There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.' O seek to have your station in Christ, and so you shall be placed beyond the reach of condemnation. You may indeed, though in Christ, suffer chastisements and corrections; yet these are the corrections and chastisements of a Father, not of a Judge; and intended for your good, to cause you forsake sin, and enhance the value of the sacrifice of Christ, and not for satisfaction to justice, whose highest demands have been fully satisfied by the Surety in your room.
7. Hence see the certainty of salvation to, and that God will bestow all the benefits purchased by Christ on, those who believe. Christ has fully satisfied justice for all those whom he represented as a Mediator; so that it has nothing to demand of the Surety, nor of those whose persons he sustained in that undertaking. Hence their salvation is infallibly secured; and justice is bound to accomplish it. Mercy pleads for it; justice fully satisfied cannot dispute the validity of the claim, and cheerfully consents to their acquittal from guilt and condemnation. Thus righteousness and peace kiss each other in the absolution of the guilty sinner that believes in Jesus.
8. Bless God for the gospel, that discovers unto as this infallible way of being delivered from condemnation and wrath, this sure way to peace and reconciliation with God, this precious balm for a troubled conscience, and this effectual remedy for appeasing an angry God. O prize the gospel, and the precious discoveries thereof, in which all blessings are contained; and accept of a slain Savior as your only Redeemer from sin and wrath, from Hell and condemnation; and glory in his cross, and what he has done for your redemption and deliverance.
OF CHRIST'S INTERCESSION
THE second part of our Lord's priestly office is his interceding for his people, namely, all those for whom he satisfied divine justice. As his intercession is founded upon his making satisfaction to law and justice for their sins, and plainly supposes his having offered himself a sacrifice in their name and stead, so the objects thereof must be the same. As he died only for those for whom he intercedes, so he intercedes for none but such as he shed his precious blood for, as has been shown in the preceding part of this discourse.
In discoursing further from this point, I shall show,
1. The different periods of our Lord's intercession.
2. Wherein his intercession consists.
3. The necessity of it.
4. Deduce an inference or two.
First, We may consider the periods of our Lord's intercession. And this may be taken up in a threefold period of time wherein it was made, namely, before his incarnation, during the state of his humiliation, and now in his exalted state.
1. Christ interceded for his church and people before his manifestation in the flesh. Though this office be most eminently performed since the union of the divine and human natures in the person of Christ, yet it was also effectually performed by him before his assumption of our flesh. He interposed then by virtue of his engagement to make his soul an offering for sin; and he intercedes now by virtue of his actual performance of that engagement. 'As he was a Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,' so by that same reason he was an advocate pleading from the foundation of the world. It was through the merciful interposition of the Son of God, in consequence of the covenant between the Father and him, that deserved vengeance came not upon the world for sin at the first commission of it. We find him in the Old Testament pleading for the church long before he assumed the human nature, Zechariah 1:12.and the saints making use of Christ's name in their prayers to God long before he was born, Daniel 9:17. Thus his intercession began in Heaven thousands of years before his abode on earth.
2. He interceded for his people in his state of abasement and humiliation, Hebrews 1:7. 'In the days of his flesh he offered up prayers and supplications to God with strong cries and tears.' This manner of intercession was suitable and congruous to his abased state. Though he was despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; yet his intercession was not less prevalent with God, for 'he was heard in that he feared.' You may see with what majesty and authority he prayed on the behalf of all the elect, John 17:24. 'Father, I will that they also whom you have given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory which you have given me: for you loved me before the foundation of the world.' Yes, even when he was under the sharpest agonies, when he was bruised by God, and broken by men, groaning under the wrath of the one, and the wrongs of the other, he forgets not to put up petitions for his crucifiers, Luke 23:34. 'Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.' And many of those who imbrued their hands in his innocent blood, obtained a gracious pardon through his prevalent intercession.
3. He is pleading now for his people in Heaven, in his exalted state. When he had offered up himself a sacrifice on the cross, he ascended into the most holy place, and there prosecutes the same suit that he had commenced on the earth. Hence says the apostle, Romans 8:34. 'It is Christ that died, yes rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
Secondly, I am to show wherein Christ's intercession consists.
1. He does not plead for his people in Heaven, in such a supplicatory and humble manner as he prayed for them when he was on the earth. He falls not down upon his knees with a deep prostration of soul, lifting up his eyes with tears and strong cries. Such humble prayers and supplications were suited only to the days of his flesh, when he appeared in the form of a servant, and was found in the likeness of man; but they do not become him now in his state of glory, when he is stripped of all those natural infirmities and marks of indigence with which he was clothed in the world. But, positively,
2. His intercession lies in the following things.
1st, In his appearing in Heaven in his people's nature, and on their account. After he had shed his precious blood on the earth for the expiation of their sin, he rose again from the dead, and ascended into Heaven as their Advocate and Intercessor, that, by the virtue of his meritorious sacrifice, he might answer all the charges brought in against them, and sue out all the good things that belonged to them, Hebrews 9:24. 'Christ is entered into Heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.'
2dly, In presenting the memorials of his death and passion as a moving plea on their account. This was typified and prefigured by the high priest's carrying the blood of the sacrifice into the most holy place, and presenting it before the Lord. He was not to go in before the mercy-seat without it; and there was no interceding but by virtue of it. So the whole power and efficacy of Christ's intercession is founded upon his meritorious sufferings. His soul that was bruised and made an offering for sin, and his body that was wounded and broken upon the cross, are daily presented before God, and will remain in the divine presence forever, as an eternal memorial of his bloody sufferings. This has a powerful efficacy in prevailing with God. Hence, by an usual figure, an interceding voice is attributed to his blood, Hebrews 12:24. 'It speaks better things than that of Abel.' Christ's blood speaks, though not vocally and with oral expressions, yet powerfully and efficaciously. It speaks in the same manner that Abel's blood did, though not for the same end; this cried for vengeance upon wicked Cain that shed it; but that pleads for mercy and favor to all believing sinners. We have a rare illustration of the efficacious intercession of Christ in Heaven, in the famous story of Amyntas, who appeared as an advocate for his brother Æschylus, who was strongly accused, and in great danger of being condemned to die. This Amyntas having performed great services for the state, and merited highly of the commonwealth, in whose service one of his hands was cut off in battle, comes into the court on his brother's behalf, and said nothing, but only lifted up his arm, and showed them an arm without a hand; which so moved them, that immediately they acquitted his brother. And thus you have Christ represented visionally, Revelation 5:6 as standing between God and us, 'And I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne, and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders stood a lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns, and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God, sent forth into all the earth.' That is, he was represented as bearing in his glorified body the marks of his death and sacrifice; the wounds which he received for his people's sins on the earth, are as it were still visible and fresh in Heaven, as a prevailing argument with the Father to give forth the mercies that he pleads for to them.
3dly, In presenting his will and desire to the Father on their behalf, not in a humble and supplicatory manner, in the way of charity, but by a claim in the way of justice. He now pleads that his people may be put in fall possession of all the blessings which were purchased for them by his bloody death. We find him pleading to this purpose immediately before his passion, John 17:24 forfeited. He minds the Father as it were of the covenant that was between them both, of his performing the condition required on his part, and so claims the performance of God's promise as a debt due to his meritorious obedience even unto death. He has 'made his soul an offering for sin;' and therefore pleads that he may 'see his seed, prolong his days,' and that the pleasure of the Lord may prosper in his hands,' Isaiah 53:10, 11.
4thly, In his presenting his people's prayers and petitions unto God and pleading that they may be accepted and granted for his sake. Their prayers and religious performances are both impure and imperfect; but his precious merit, applied by his powerful intercession, purifies and perfects them. This skillful Advocate puts them into form and language suited to the methods of the court of Heaven, and by his great interest there procures them a speedy hearing. This was excellently typified by the high priest's going in before the Lord with the blood of the sacrifice, and his hands full of incense. After he had offered the sacrifice, without, he was to take his hands full of those aromatic drugs of which the incense was composed, without the veil, and put them in a censor of gold full of fire, and cover the mercy-seat with the fumes of it. This was a figure of Christ's intercession and offering up his people's sacrifices to God. He is the alone altar upon which our sacrifices must ascend before the Lord with a grateful fume: the incense of his merit must be added to our prayers, to make them ascend before the mercy-seat as a sacrifice of a sweet-smelling savor. Hence he is represented, Revelation 8:3, as an angel standing at the golden altar which was before the throne, with a golden censor in his hand, offering up the prayers of all the saints, perfuming them with the incense that was given him. By the much incense mentioned here, we are to understand the mighty quantity of merit and the great power of his intercession, which was a sweet savor to all his people's sacrifices, and renders them acceptable to God.
5thly, In his answering all the bills of indictment which are brought in against them. Many times a believer is brought in as an arraigned criminal before the divine tribunal, where Satan appears as the accuser, brings in the charge of sin, pleads the righteousness of the law, solicits for judgment upon his accusations, and for the execution of the curse due to the crime. The justice of God calls for vengeance, and conscience thunders out nothing but Hell and wrath. Now, while the believer is in these dismal circumstances, Christ steps in and answers the charge. He pleads the efficacy of his merit against the greatness of the believing sinner's crimes, and his satisfaction to justice by the death of the cross against all the demands and challenges of the law. And thus the sentence of condemnation due unto the sinner for his sin is averted, and a sentence of absolution is pronounced, upon the merit and plea of this powerful Intercessor. Hence we find the apostle glorying in this, Romans 8:33, 34. 'Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies: who is he who condemns? It is Christ that died, yes rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.' Satan may accuse believers; but Christ can soon silence him. Thus, when Joshua the high priest stood before the Lord in filthy garments, Satan stood at his right hand to accuse him; but the angel, namely, the angel of the covenant, Jesus Christ, interposed, saying, 'The Lord rebuke you, O Satan,' Zechariah 3:1, 2. Though their garments be filthy, yet Christ can take them away, and clothe them with change of clothing. Though Satan be always ready to resist them, yet Christ stands always at the right-hand of God in Heaven, to plead for them, and silence Satan.
Thirdly, I shall show some of the grounds or reasons of our High Priest's intercession.
1. Christ intercedes for his people, because he had a commission, a call, and command from the Father, for this purpose. Isaiah 42:6. 'I the Lord have called you in righteousness.' So far was our mighty intercessor from engaging in this service as an intruder or usurper, that he entered upon it under the warrant of Heaven's commission. The Lord called him to be a priest. For truly 'he glorified not himself, to be made an High priest; but he who said unto him, You are my Son, today have I begotten you,' Hebrews 5:5. And as the Lord called him to be a priest, so to all the acts of the priestly office. He called him to make his soul an offering for sin, to pour out his life unto death, and to shed his blood for the satisfaction of offended justice. In a word, he called him to make intercession for transgressors. For says the Lord, 'I will cause him to draw near, and he shall approach unto me.'
2. He intercedes for his people, because they were given him for this end, John 17:6. 'Your they were, and you gave them me.' The elect that the Father gave to Christ were his own three ways. They were creatures, and therefore their life and being were derived from him. They were criminals, and therefore their life and being were forfeited to him. They were chosen, and therefore their living and being were designed for him. They were given to Christ that the election of grace might not be frustrated, that none of the little ones might perish. Yes they were given him, that the undertaking of Christ might not be fruitless; for they were given him as his seed, in whom he should see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied, and consequently might not spend his strength and shed his blood in vain. Now, because the elect were thus given to Christ, therefore he intercedes for them, John 17:9, 'I pray for them: I pray not for the world but for them which you have given me, for they are your.
3. He intercedes for his people, because it is a special part of his priestly office to do so. As the high priest under the law was not only to slay and offer the sacrifice in the outer part of the tabernacle, on the anniversary day of expiation, but to enter with the fresh blood into the sanctuary, and sprinkle it seven times; and not only so, but was to bring a censor full of burning coals off the altar, with incense in his hands, to be put upon the fire before the Lord within the veil, that so the cloud in the incense might cover the mercy-seat: in like manner, after our great High Priest had offered himself a sacrifice to God in his bloody death, he entered into Heaven, not only with his blood, but with the incense of his prayers, as a cloud about the mercy-seat, to preserve by his life the salvation which he had purchased by his death. Hence the apostle assures us, that our salvation depends upon his intercession, and his intercession upon his priesthood, Hebrews 7:24, 25. 'This man, because he continues ever, has an unchangeable priesthood. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost, that come unto God by him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them.'
4. He intercedes for his people, because he was their atoning sacrifice ; for the efficacy of his plea depends upon the value and virtue of his sacrifice. As the high priest under the law could not enter into the holy of holies, until by the slaying of the sacrifice he had blood to carry with him: so no more could our Priest be admitted to solicit at the throne of grace, until by his death he had satisfied the tribunal of justice. Thus, because he paid the debt as our Surety, he is fit to plead the payment as our Attorney. What he finished on earth, he continually presents in Heaven. By shedding his blood he made expiation, and by presenting it he makes intercession. In the one he prepared the remedy, and in the other he applies it.
5. He intercedes for his people, because his doing so is one of the great ends of his ascension and session at the right hand of God. In his incarnation he came down from the Father to acquaint us with his gracious purposes, and how far he had agreed with God in our behalf; and at his ascension he went from us to the Father, to sue out the benefits which he had so dearly purchased. He drew up an answer upon the cross to the bill that sin, by virtue of the law, had drawn against us, and ascended to Heaven as an Advocate to plead that answer upon his throne, and to rejoin to all the replies against it. And therefore the apostle tells us, that he is 'entered into Heaven, to appear in the presence of God for us,' Hebrews 9:24.
6. He intercedes for his people, because of that matchless and amazing love which he bears to them. He loves them with a love infinitely transcending the reach of human or angelic conception; he loves them with a love that knows neither height nor depth, breadth nor length, but is absolutely incomprehensible. His love to them brought him down from Heaven, and made him willingly undergo all those sorrows and sufferings, which like impetuous torrents poured in upon him. And certainly, seeing in his love and in his pity he purchased eternal redemption for them, he will never cease to plead for the application of it to them. Seeing in such plentiful streams he shed his precious blood to save them, it is not to be imagined that he will spare his prayers for them.
7. He intercedes for his people, because this service of love is that wherein he takes the greatest delight and pleasure. Before time existed, his delights were with the sons of men; and when the fullness of time did dawn, he said, 'Lo, I come,' etc. He had a delight to live with the sons of men, and to die for them. And no sooner does he enter Heaven after his death and resurrection, but there he delights to act on their account, to plead their cause, and to intercede for all the blessings of his purchase to them. This is the will of the Father, and he delights to do it.
I conclude all with an inference or two.
1. How wonderful is the love of God in appointing an Intercessor for us, not an angel, but his own beloved Son! Were we left to ourselves, and to our own pleas, our least sins would ruin us, and all the grounds of intercession we could plead upon would be rejected, as unworthy of acceptance before the throne of God.
2. How wonderful is the love of our Redeemer, in condescending to act so friendly a part to us, notwithstanding all our unworthiness and foul miscarriages against him! How should it fill our hearts with wonder, that he who is our Judge, should take upon him to manage our cause in the court of Heaven; that he who has a mouth to condemn us, and wrath to consume us for our sins, should bind the arms of his wrath, and employ his tongue to solicit our cause in the court of Heaven; that he who has a mouth to condemn us, and wrath to consume us for our sins, should bind the arms of his wrath, and employ his tongue to solicit our cause and procure us the richest blessings!
3. Then true believers have a friend in the court of Heaven, who is agenting their cause, managing their concerns, and will make all things work together for their good. Whatever their cause be, and however fearful they may be about the issue of it, all shall go right at length, through the interest of their mighty Intercessor.
4. Believers cannot finally miscarry, and utterly fall away: for they shall be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. Their Redeemer ever lives to make intercession for them. So that neither their own sins, nor all the temptations of Satan, nor the frowns or allurements of the world, shall ever prevail to make them fall from their steadfastness, or from the favor of God: for Christ, as their High Priest, has died for their sins, and will never intermit his suits to God in their behalf until they be safely brought to glory.
5. Lastly, Employ the Lord Jesus Christ as your High Priest, to bring you to God, depending on his merit as the ground of the expiation of your guilt, and giving you a title unto eternal life. And make use of him as your Advocate with the Father, to procure you all the blessings you stand in need of for time and eternity.
OF CHRIST'S KINGLY OFFICE
PSALM 2:6.—Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Zion.
THE New Testament leaves us no ground to doubt of our Lord Jesus Christ being the person here spoken of, as several passages in this psalm are expressly therein applied to him. The words contain a direct assertion of Christ's being appointed King of Zion, his spiritual kingdom—Therein we have,
1. His office: He is a King, invested with all regal power and princely authority: being 'King of kings, and Lord of lords;' yes 'the Prince of the kings of the earth.' And this name he has written on his vesture and on his thigh, Revelation 19:16.
2. His kingdom, over which he rules, the holy hill of Zion; which was an eminent type of the gospel-church, and is called holy, because the temple, the house of God was built upon it.
3. His right to this kingdom; I have sent him my King, says Jehovah. The Father has placed him in that office, giving him, as God-man, Mediator, 'all power in Heaven and in earth.' He is 'given to be Head over all things to the church.'
4. The stability of this kingdom against all attempts made to oppose or destroy it, Yet have I set my King, &c.—Though enemies roar and rage, and leave no means unessayed to hinder the erection and establishment thereof; yet all their plots shall be unsuccessful, and all their deliberations shall miscarry. I have set him as King, and will maintain his throne.
The doctrinal proposition arising from the words is,
DOCTRINE. 'Christ executes the Office of a King.'
In discoursing from this doctrine, I shall show,
I. That Christ is a King.
II. What sort of a kingdom the kingdom of Christ is.
III. The acts of his kingly office.
IV. The properties of this King.
V. Lastly, Deduce some inferences for application.
I. I am to show that our Lord Jesus Christ is a King. This will appear, if you consider,
1. That he was prophesied of in the Old Testament under this character. Thus old Jacob on his death-bed says of him, Genesis 49:10. 'The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a law-giver from between his feet, until Shiloh come.' And says the evangelical prophet, Isaiah 11:1, 2, 3. 'There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge, and of the fear of the Lord: and shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord, and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears.'
2. That he was of old promised to his people under this notion: Isaiah 9:6, 7. 'Unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth even forever. Zechariah 9:9, 'Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold your King comes unto you: he is just and having salvation, lowly, and riding upon an donkey, and upon a colt the foal of an donkey.' Micah 5:2. 'Out of you shall he come forth unto me, that is to be Ruler in Israel.' He is called the King by way of eminency, Cant 1:4. 'The King has brought me into his banqueting-house.' Ezekiel 34:24. 'I the Lord will be their God, and my servant David a prince among them.' That he should be a King, was declared to his mother, by the angel, before his conception in her womb, Luke 1:32, 33. 'He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David. And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end.' And hence he is called 'King of kings, and lord of lords.' Revelation 17:14.
3. That he has all the ensigns of royalty. He has a sword: hence it is said, Psalm 45:3. 'Gird your sword upon your thigh, O you Most Mighty.' By this we are to understand the Word of God, which is the great instrument by which he maintains and propagates the glory and honor of his kingdom in the world.—A scepter, which is another badge of royal majesty, Hebrews 1:8. 'A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of your kingdom.' By this we are to understand his Spirit, which he puts forth in the government of the world, and in his operations of grace in the hearts of his people, guiding and conforming them, through his word and ordinances, to the holy will of God.—A crown: It is said, Revelation 6:2 that 'a crown was given him, and he went forth conquering and to conquer.' And we read of a crown with which his mother crowned him in the day of his espousals, Canticles 3:11.—An escutcheon or coat of arms: He bears the lion in his arms; hence called 'the Lion of the tribe of Judah,' Revelation 5:5; which imports that he should be a great conqueror and a victorious King.—A throne, Hebrews 1:8. 'Your throne O God, is forever and ever.—Subjects, over whom he rules, even all the creatures in Heaven and in earth, Psalm 2:9. 'His kingdom rules over all,' Psalm 103:19. All the angels of Heaven have taken the oath of allegiance to him, Hebrews 1:6. 'Let all the angels of God worship him.' More especially he rules in the church. God the Father has set the crown on his head, and he holds it by immediate tenure from Heaven.—He enacts laws, which all his subjects are bound to obey. His laws are contained in his word, and they reach both the outward and the inward man.
4. That he sealed this truth with his precious blood.—When Pilate asked him, 'Are you a King then?' he answered, 'You say that I am a King.' To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world. On this account it is said of him, that 'before Pontius Pilate he witnessed a good confession,' 1 Timothy 6:13.
From all which it is evident, that our Lord Jesus is a King. Yes, he is King of kings, and has a pre-eminence over them all; and therefore he is called 'the Prince of the kings of the earth.' And indeed he must needs be so; for it is by him that kings reign and princes decree justice.—They all hold their crowns by immediate tenure from this great King. And he infinitely outvies them all; having the highest throne, the largest dominions, and the longest possession.
II. I proceed to show the nature of Christ's kingdom, or what sort of a kingdom it is. Christ has a twofold kingdom.
1. An essential kingdom. He is Lord and King over all the creatures by nature, inasmuch as he is the eternal Son of God, equal with his Father in all things. In this respect he has a universal empire, which extends over all things in Heaven and earth, yes and to Hell itself. He is the sole Monarch of the whole world; and all the princes and potentates of the earth are but his viceregents that govern under, and should rule for him. He is 'the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords,' as the apostle styles him, 1 Timothy 6:15.
2. He has an economical or Mediatory kingdom. Originally the kingdom belongs to him as God, and derivatively it belongs to him as God-man and Mediator. He is constituted King by divine appointment and institution, I have set my King upon my holy hill of Zion. He is invested with authority over all the creatures; hence it is said, Ephesians 1:22. 'God has put all things under his feet.' He rules from sea to sea, and to the ends of all the earth, yes to the utmost bounds of God's creation. 'He has given him power over all flesh,' as this King himself says, John 17:2. All things are subject to his government, and ready to fulfill his pleasure, when he issues his word of command.
The church is his peculiar and special kingdom. God 'has given him to be head over all things to the church,' Ephesians 1:22. This kingdom is a spiritual kingdom: hence he says, 'My kingdom is not of this world,' John 18:36. The king thereof appeared not in worldly pomp and grandeur, attended with a splendid equipage, surrounded with armed guards, or having a brilliant and magnificent court, but in spiritual splendor, suited to the nature of his kingdom, Zechariah 9:9 forfeited. His throne is in the heavens, not on earth, Psalm 110:1. His scepter is a spiritual one, the Word of God, which he wields for the good of his people; it is the rod of his strength, which he sends out of Zion, and by the instrumentality of it he makes them willing in the day of his power, Psalm 110:2, 3. Compare Isaiah 2:3. 'Out of Zion shall go forth a law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.' The subjects of this kingdom are spiritual men, born of God, begotten of the word of truth, the incorruptible seed of the word, John 1:12. The way of its administration is spiritual, reaching neither men's bodies nor purses, but their consciences; 'the weapons' of it 'not being carnal, but mighty through God to the palling down of strong holds,' 2 Corinthians 10:4. Its laws are spiritual, reaching the innermost parts of the heart; and the benefits of it are spiritual, righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Spirit,' etc.
The administration of his government with respect to this kingdom is either external or internal.
1, It is external; and that again is either more general, or more particular.
(1.) More general, in the course of his providence. He as Mediator has a providential influence on all the affairs of this world, ordering and determining them to the special benefit and interest of his people. Hence it is that all things work together for the good of those who love God. We have an admirable scheme of divine providence in Ezekiel 1. There you may see how all the wheels, that is, motions and revolutions here in this inferior world, are guided and directed by the Spirit that is in them; and in verse 26 it is all run up into the supreme cause: there you find one like the Son of Man, which is Jesus Christ, sitting upon the throne, and giving forth orders for the government of all.
(2.) It is more particular, in his appointing laws, ordinances, and officers, in his church, to manage and govern it, and to inflict censures upon scandalous offenders.
2. It is internal, in the hearts of his people. He subdues them to himself in a day of power, writes his laws upon their hearts, and rules and governs them. In this respect it is said, Luke 17:21. 'The kingdom of God is within you.' There he sits enthroned King, and sways his royal scepter. But more of this anon.
III. The acts of Christ's kingly office may be reduced to these heads, namely, subduing sinners to himself, ruling and governing them, defending and protecting them, restraining his own and their enemies, and conquering them. Of each of these I shall treat in order.
First, Christ exercises his kingly office in subduing a people to himself, making them willing in the day of his power to submit to his authority and scepter, Psalm 110:3 and so subjecting them to him as willing subjects. For this end consider,
1. That the great design of Christ's kingly office as Mediator is to raise up to himself a kingdom in the affections of the kingdoms of the earth, Acts 15:14 and to make the subjects of men the subjects of the divine Mediator. So that those who will not allow a spiritual kingdom within a temporal one, refuse Christ to be King.
2. Our Lord has a right to this kingdom, having purchased it with his blood, Acts 20:28. He comes not without a title to conquer, but has the title of his Father's gift and his own purchase. Before he could attain to the possession of this kingdom, he behooved to swim through a sea of bloody sufferings, and he purchased every subject with the immense price of his precious blood. Thus his title is indefeasible.
3. Though our Lord has this just right to the kingdom, yet his subjects have sworn allegiance to the Prince of darkness, and are in actual rebellion against him. That is the common character of them, which we have Titus 3:3. 'We ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.' And they will never yield to him, until they be overcome by his mighty power. He gets no subjects but by stroke of sword, and the exertion of the same power that was put forth in his own resurrection.
4. Christ as a King does by power overcome them at length, and makes them willingly submit to him, renounce obedience to the devil, the world, and their own base lusts, his enemies, and causes them cheerfully stoop to the yoke of his obedience, and to say, as Isaiah 26:13. 'O Lord our God, other lords besides you have had dominion over us: but by you only will we make mention of your name.'
5. The weapons with which Christ subdues his subjects are his word and Spirit, whereby they are effectually convinced of their sin and rebellion, and reduced to subjection to him. The word is the rod of his power, by which he has subdued nations to himself. It was by this word that in the primitive times he overturned the empire of the devil, silenced the heathen oracles, and demolished the Pagan idolatrous worship. And because the word comes to many without the Spirit, therefore Christ has many subjects in appearance only, mere pretenders to loyalty to him; they are really the subjects of Satan, and only feign submission to Zion's King. But where the Spirit comes with the word, there the heart is subjected to Christ in very deed, 2 Corinthians 10:4; and Christ has a kingdom not only among them, but within them.
Secondly, Christ exercises his kingly office in ruling and governing his subjects. No kingdom can be without a government; and Christ's kingdom must needs be an orderly kingdom, which he himself governs as the supreme Head and Monarch. Now,
1. Forasmuch as the church is a visible society on earth, whose head is in Heaven, Christ governs them externally.
(1.) Giving them laws according to which they are to demean themselves every way towards God and towards their neighbor, Isaiah 33:22. 'The Lord is our Lawgiver.' Those laws which are the laws of the kingdom of Christ, are written in the Bible, and are a transcript of his perfections, and derive all their authority and vigor from him alone, and not from the church, or any body of men whatever. And none have power to add to or diminish from the laws of this great King.
(2.) He gives them officers in whose hands he has lodged this government who are to be accountable to him for their administration, on whom they depend, and from whom they derive their power. These are neither Pope nor prelates, none of these being officers of Christ's appointment; nor yet the civil magistrate, who as such is not so much as a member of the church; and while there were no magistrates but what were enemies to the church and the cause of Christ, yet Christ appointed a government therein; as appears from 1 Corinthians 12:28. 'God has set some in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments, diversities of tongues.' But these officers are preaching and ruling elders; as is clear from what the apostle says, 1 Timothy 5:17. 'Let the elders that rule well, be counted worthy of double honor, especially they who labor in the word and doctrine.'
(3.) He gives discipline and censures to control the unruly, and check the scandalous, and keep the society clean; to which all that own Christ as a King ought to be subject, who rules his people by church discipline, as well as teaches them by the ministry of men. This appears from what our Lord himself says, Matthew 18:17, 18. 'If he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church; but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto you as an heathen man, and a publican. Truly I say unto you, Whatever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound in Heaven, and whatever you shall loose on earth, shall be loosed in Heaven.'
2. But seeing Christ is God, and his laws reach the inner man, which lies open to no other but himself, he governs his people internally.
(1.) Writing his law in their hearts, in consequence of the divine promise, Hebrews 8:10 holding forth their duty to them by an inward evidence, making them to know what his will and pleasure is, that they may obey it from the heart. Hence he says, Isaiah 30:21, 'Your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, This is the way, walk in it, when you turn to the right hand, and when you turn to the left.'
(2.) He powerfully inclines and over-rules them by his Spirit unto obedience, while he sits at the helm, and steers the ship of the soul what way he will, Acts 20:22. To which we may add,
(3.) Those secret rewards and corrections which are sent from his own hand; while he bestows on them spiritual comforts and soul-feasts when in the way of their duty, and gives them such strokes for their correction, even for secret faults, as may let them see, that though their King be in Heaven, yet he judges on the earth. Hence he says to the church of Pergamos, Revelation 2:17. 'To him that over-comes will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knows, saving he who receives it.' And to the church of the Laodiceans he says, Revelation 3:19. 'As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten.'
Thirdly, Christ executes his kingly office in defending his people. The kingdom of Christ always had and ever will have many enemies, who will continually be within bow-shot of its subjects. These enemies are the devil, the flesh, the world, and death. Christ defends against these, as a king defends his subjects.
1. By preserving his church in being, notwithstanding all the cunning and furious attempts to destroy her. Hence the bush, though it burn, will not consume. Of her lie says, Isaiah 27:3. 'I the Lord do keep it: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.' And he keeps every particular believer, so as they never totally and finally fall away, John 10:28. 'I give unto them eternal life (says he): and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand.'
2. By giving them necessary support and help under all sufferings, troubles, and temptations, never leaving them, no not at the hour of death. Hence it is said, Isaiah 63:9. 'In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them: in his love and in his pity he redeemed them, and he bare them, and carried them all the days of old.' 1 Corinthians 10:13. 'There has no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man; but God is faithful who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that you may be able to bear it.' For this he makes use of the angels as he will, they being 'all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation,' Hebrews 1:14. And he can employ men, even the worst of men, in that service: hence the earth helped the woman, and opened her month, and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth, Revelation 12:16.
Fourthly, Christ executes his kingly office in restraining his enemies, and those of his people. While, though their power remains with them to annoy his people, yet he sets bounds to them, over which they cannot pass; Psalm 76:10. 'Surely the wrath of man shall praise you (says the Psalmist): the remainder of wrath shall you restrain.'—Christ has all his and his people's enemies, outward and inward, in a chain: and no further can they go than he is pleased to let out a link to them. If it were not so, all would quickly be over-run; but one jot they cannot go beyond his permission.
Fifthly and lastly, Christ executes his kingly office in conquering his enemies, and those of his people. This conquest is twofold.
(1.) When now he takes away their power in part. Thus is the devil conquered already, that he has not all the world so at his will, and under his yoke of slavery, as before the coming of Christ, when he ruled among the nations with an unlimited sway. And thus the devil and the flesh are conquered in the day of converting grace, when the power of these enemies is broken, and the captives are delivered from the tyranny and bondage in which they were formerly held. Thus the wicked world is conquered, when their rage against the people of God is laid aside, and the church enjoys tranquility: 'For I, says the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her, Zechariah 2:5. And death is conquered when its sting is taken away, which it is as to every believer; so that they can say, 'O death, where is your sting?' 1 Corinthians 15:55.
(2.) There is a complete conquest remaining, which will be at the last day, when Christ will gather in all his people into one glorious company, transport them into those mansions of bliss which he has prepared for them, and reign over them forever in Heaven: when all his own, and his people's enemies are utterly destroyed from the presence of God, and the glory of his power. 'For he must reign until all his enemies be put under his feet,' 1 Corinthians 15:25. Then death and Hell shall be cast into the lake of fire, Revelation 20:14 and the devil and all his slaves shall be shut up forever in the infernal Tophet. This shall be the most signal display of the glorious conquests of this King, and the trophies of his victory shall be the subject of the song of the redeemed forever.
This kingdom of Christ will be eternal, Luke 1:33. 'He shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end.' Daniel 2:44. 'The God of Heaven shall set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed,—and it shall stand forever.' It is true the way of its present administration will cease, and so he will deliver up the kingdom to his Father, but exhibiting it as consummated and perfected. But Christ shall remain the King, Head, and Husband of his church forever, Revelation 19:7 and he shall be the eternal bond of union between God and the saints.
IV. Let us consider some of the properties or qualities of Zion's King.
1. He is a King of ancient, glorious, and honorable extract: for he is the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express image of his person. His goings forth were of old, from everlasting. And he is God over all, blessed forever.
2. He is an absolute king, who makes laws for his subjects, but is not bound by any himself. His will is his law, and he does without control whatever seems good to himself in Heaven and in earth. Yes, so uncontrollable is his government, that none may oblige him to render a reason of his actions. 'Who may say unto him, What do you?' But though Christ be an absolute monarch, yet his government is no way tyrannical, but managed according to the eternal rules of righteousness, justice, and holiness.
3. He is a wise King: for he is the wisdom of God, yes, God only wise; and therefore infinitely able to guide his subjects through all the labyrinths of danger and difficulty wherein they may be involved; while he 'teaches them in the way of wisdom, and leads them in right paths; so that when they go, their steps shall not be straitened: and when they run, they shall not stumble,' Proverbs 4:11, 12.
4. Christ is a very powerful King: for he has more than the strength of an unicorn; yes, he has an arm that is full of power, being the Lord of hosts, strong and mighty in battle; and therefore infinitely able to secure his subjects against all the attempts which devils or men can make against them. Yes, so great is his strength, and so mighty is his power, that one angry blast thereof will make all his enemies to fly as chaff before the wind; and therefore he says, 'Who will set the briars and thorns against me in battle; I would go through them, I would burn them up together,' Isaiah 27:4.
5. Christ is a just King: 'Just and right is he.' Though clouds and darkness may be about him, yet 'justice and judgment are the habitation of his throne,' Psalm 97:2. So that his government is impartially exercised, without any by-respect to the great or the small, the rich or the poor, etc. Neither the baseness of the poor and low, nor the honor and greatness of the high and noble, will incline him to do anything in the least inconsistent with the immutable rules of perfect justice. 'He accepts not the persons of princes, nor regards the rich more than the poor; for they are all the work of his hands,' Job 34:19.
6. Christ is a very merciful King. Mercy is the prevailing attribute of his nature, which he delights to make the children of men feel the benign effects of. Therefore he has proclaimed himself to be 'the Lord, the Lord God merciful and gracious.' He does not willingly grieve nor afflict the children of men. He takes no pleasure in the blood of his most implacable and inveterate foes; and bears with a very tender hand upon his afflicted, broken, and discouraged people. For the bruised reed he will not break, nor quench the smoking flax. He heals the broken in heart, and binds up all their wounds. In all the afflictions of his people he is afflicted; and he who touches them, touches the apple of his eye.
7. Christ is a very meek and patient King. Never any in the world could have borne such indignities, or digested such affronts, as he has met with from such of his own subjects, to whom he has shown the most distinguishing kindness. Had he not been thus patient, Judah and Ephraim had soon been unpeopled. 'As for them, they were bent to backsliding: though they called them to the Most High, none at all would exalt him,' Hosea 11:7. Though he sent many prophets unto them, calling upon them, and saying,' Return, you backsliding children' etc. yet they did not regard them. Who after this could imagine, that this just and jealous King would have entertained one thought of kindness towards them? yet hear what he says, 'How shall I give you up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver you, Israel? how shall I make you as Admah? how shall I set you as Zeboim? mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together,' verse 8.
8. Christ is a very beautiful King. His glory outshines the sun in its full strength. The united constellations of all created beauty fall infinitely short of his; for he is fairer than the children of men, yes, he is altogether lovely.
9. Christ is a most humble and condescending King: for he does not disdain to be acquainted with the meanest among the sons of men; the beggar will be as welcome to him as the prince. The poor and the rich are all one to him; and he takes as much notice of Job on the dunghill, as of David on the throne. Hear what the prophet, in the name of this great King, says, Isaiah 66:1, 2. 'Thus says the Lord, the Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: where is the house that you build unto me? and where is the place of my rest? for all those things has mine hand made, and all those things have been, says the Lord: but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembles at my word.'
10. Christ is a very rich and opulent King. The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof. He is the heir of all things. Honor and riches are with him, yes, durable riches and righteousness. So that those who are his honest and faithful subjects shall never want anything that is good for them. Such are the immense treasures and infinite riches of this glorious King, that all the ministers on earth, and all the angels in Heaven, cannot possibly lay them open. For can they grasp the heavens in their arms, and the sun in the hollow of their hands? can they weigh the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance? Suppose they could do all this, and a thousand times more, yet could they not give an account of the estate of this my King. So that his subjects shall never want either grace or glory.
11. He is an immortal and everlasting King. 'The heavens and the earth shall perish, but he shall endure; yes, all of them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shall they be changed. But he is the same, and his years shall have no end,' Psalm 102:26, 27. Though the best, the wisest, and the richest kings upon earth will die, and leave their subjects exposed to many inconveniences consequent on their death, yet this King of glory lives for evermore, and will rule over his subjects with justice, mercy, and righteousness, through all the ages of eternity.
It remains to make some improvement of this subject.
1. The kings of the earth have no ground to grudge the kingdom of Christ its freedom in their dominions; seeing it is a spiritual kingdom, and quite of another nature than the kingdoms of this world; and interferes not with any of the just rights and prerogatives of earthly crowns. Yet how sad is it that this kingdom should be an eye-sore to the kings of the earth, and that they should employ their power to suppress and bear it down?
2. The Pope's supremacy, and the supremacy of the magistrate over all persons, and in all causes, whereby they have been made heads of the church, is daring blasphemy against Christ, a bold usurpation of his crown and dignity, and high rebellion against him, who will not suffer the jewels to be stolen from his crown, to deck the head of any earthly power whatever, without the severest testimony of his resentment.
3. There is a government of the church distinct from and independent upon the civil government, lodged in the hands of church-officers, whereby they have a power, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to meet in judicatories, transact matters there according to the word and laws of this King, to dissolve their meetings in his name, to appoint fasts and thanksgivings, as the state of the church may require, to inflict censures on offenders, bind and loose, and to do everything necessary for advancing this kingdom in a spiritual way, but no otherwise. And whoever presumes to hinder them in these acts of administration, or arrogate any of them to themselves, are in so far enemies to Christ and his royal prerogatives.
4. This government of the church is not alterable by any power on earth, whether civil or ecclesiastic; nor have they that are entrusted with it any power to give up the rights and privileges conferred on them by Christ to any person or persons whatever. If they do so, they are unfaithful to their trust, and their conduct will be highly resented another day.
5. None have power to appoint any parts of worship in the Church that Christ has not appointed. For he is the sole Lawgiver of the church, and has in his word appointed the platform of the worship which he requires of his subjects. And therefore for any to appoint ceremonies and rights of worship which bear not the stamp of his institution, act in opposition to his laws; and all their rites are useless and unprofitable. Equally culpable are those who presume to make any terms of communion, or of admission to the ordinances of the church, but such as Christ has left behind him. This is high rebellion against the King of Zion.
6. The truth of the kingdom of Christ is a solid ground of suffering, on which people may comfortably lose whatever is dear to them in the world, knowing they are in the way of their duty. And this was the ground of the sufferings of the Lord's people in the persecuting reigns before the Revolution, whose memory ought to be always regarded, for their zealous and firm adherence to the prerogatives of Christ's kingdom.
7. The church shall ride out all the storms that can blow upon her, whether from earth or Hell. All plots and contrivances against her shall be defeated in the end; for her King lives, and will never suffer the gates of Hell to prevail against her. The crown shall flourish on his head, when the church's enemies shall be ruined, and their kingdoms laid by forever.
8. However weak any poor believer be among many enemies, yet the broken ship shall surely come to land. The spark of grace shall be preserved amidst an ocean of difficulties and corruptions, within or without. The seed of grace sown in the heart shall be maintained, and spring up in the fruits of holiness. All Christ's honest subjects shall be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.
9. Whoever they be that refuse subjection to the ordinances and discipline of Christ's house, do in so far reject Christ from ruling over them. Consider this, you that neglect a regular attendance upon the ordinances of divine institution, and will not submit to discipline and censure for your scandalous, and offensive behavior. You are the enemies of Zion's King, and your conduct plainly declares, that you will not have this man to reign over you. Repent of this your rebellion, otherwise you shall be slain as his enemies.
10. See, believers, you that are striving against sin and Satan, and waging war with your lusts and all Christ's enemies, to whom you are to have recourse for help in all your difficulties; even to your Almighty King, who is infinitely able to help you in all straits. Make use of him daily as your King, applying and trusting to him for life, strength, defense, and victory over all your enemies.
11. Lastly, You that are strangers to Christ, captives to Satan, and under a miserable thraldom to your own lusts, will you be persuaded to come under the scepter and government of King Jesus; take on his yoke, and subject yourselves to him and his blessed government. For motives, consider,
(1.) The great glory and dignity of his person. He is God equal with the Father, the wonder of men and angels. The most glorious monarch that ever swayed scepter among men, is but like a worm of the earth, or a despicable insect in the air, compared to him. All created excellencies fall under a veil, when his glory begins to shine.
(2.) He has the best right to govern your souls. The devil and your vile lusts are all usurpers. But Christ is your rightful Lord. He has an original right to you as God, and a derivative right as Mediator. He has an unquestionable title by the grant of the Father, Acts 2:36. 'Let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God has made the same Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ.' And he has a right by his own merit and purchase, Romans 14:9. "For this end Christ both died, and rose again, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.' You are his, whether you will or not. You are entirely at his disposal. He has more power over you than the potter has over the clay. Your own consent and willingness adds nothing to his title; but it will fearfully aggravate your sin, if you refuse it.
(3.) Consider the misery of your condition until once you submit to him. You are under a miserable bondage to the devil; you are slaves to the prince of darkness; that spirit rules in you that works in all the children of disobedience. Your condition will grow still worse and worse, until it be incapable of any further addition of misery. You are now without God, without the promises of the covenant, without peace, without the pardon of sin, having no communion with God, or title to Heaven. You are slaves to your sordid lusts, under the curse of the law, and condemned already. Whenever you die out of Christ, you shall die in your sins; and he who was your ruler and leader in this world, will be both your companion and tormentor in the world to come. O fearful condition! Can you sleep quietly in your chains? When you hear that Christ was anointed by the Father to preach good tidings to the meek, to proclaim liberty to captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; should not this make you sigh, may cry, through the grates of the prison, to this glorious Deliverer who stands at the door? When you see Christ's standard pitched in the gospel, and his glorious banner displayed there, will you not repair to it, and list yourselves among his faithful subjects?
(4.) It is your greatest dignity to be subjects to Christ. Theodosius the Emperor thought it a greater honor to be a servant to Christ, than the head of an empire. Christ's subjects are called vessels of honor, a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, etc. They are consecrated, and set apart for God, to be the objects of his special grace, and the instruments of his glory and service in the world. This advances them to great dignity and honor. Subject yourselves then to Christ, and you shall arrive at the highest pinnacle of honor.
(5.) His government is most sweet and pleasant. His yoke is easy, and his burden light. His cross is better than the world's crown. Submit then to his easy scepter.
(6.) Consider the great happiness that will attend your subjecting yourselves to Christ's government. It is introductive to every privilege, mercy, and blessing, that men can desire. By this you will be delivered from the vassalage of Satan, the servitude of sin, the malediction of the law, and danger of the wrath to come. Let this prevail on you to submit to this King.
(7.) By this you will put the crown upon his head, and give him the reward of his bloody death and sufferings, when you renounce sin and Satan, and all the lusts and idols that exercised dominion over you before, and betake yourselves to him by faith, and give your hearty consent that he shall reign in your souls.
(8.) This is the design of all God's ordinances and dispensations; all the arrows in the gospel-quiver are leveled at this mark; it is the point and center into which all these blessed lines are drawn. Submit to him, then, and disappoint not the design of all his love and grace to poor sinners.
(9.) You can have no saving benefit by Christ, unless you submit to him as your King. It is through his kingly office that all his other offices are made effectual. All the blessings and benefits of his purchase are conveyed to believers this way. It is by his regal power that he changes their natures, powerfully inclines them to believe on him, and to love and obey him. If you accept not of him as your King, you can have no benefit by him at all. You must receive him as your Lord, as well as your Prophet and Priest.
(10.) Lastly, If you will not stoop and bow to him, he will break you in pieces. God has settled an irreversible decree, that 'to him every knee shall bow;' and if they do it not cheerfully and willingly, they shall be made to do it with force and constraint. He has a rod of iron, and therewith he will break in pieces the mightiest potentates of the earth that will not subject themselves to him. Hence we have that counsel given them by the Spirit of God, Psalm 2:10, 11, 12. 'Be wise now, therefore, O you kings: be instructed, you judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little: blessed are all they that put their trust in him.'
OF CHRIST'S HUMILIATION
PHILIPPIANS 2:8.—He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
HAVING discoursed of our Redeemer and his incarnation, and the several offices he executes under that character, I come now to treat of his amazing humiliation and abasement, to which he willingly submitted, in order to accomplish the redemption of elect sinners. The text holds forth his state of humiliation.
1. The voluntariness of it: it was no matter of force or compulsion; He voluntarily humbled himself.
2. The nature of it: it was obedience, namely, to the Father's will, which comprehends the whole of what Christ did and suffered for our redemption.
3. The depth of it: it was unto death; and he could go no lower. As for the kind of death, he humbled himself to the basest and most humiliating kind of it, the death of the cross. Under this is comprehended his burial, and continuing for a time under the power of death. Death had our Redeemer as low as it could carry him.
4. The continuance of this humiliation. He had a race thereof set before him, in which he continued until he came to death, as the end of it.
Christ's humiliation was a voluntary thing; he voluntarily did and suffered whatever he did and suffered for us, Psalm 40:7. 'Lo, I come,' said he. Even in the deepest points of his humiliation, 'he was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth,' to oppose the humbling treatment he was exposed to. Man fell off from God by his ambition, and therefore was Christ humbled, that he might be recovered again from his misery to the favor of God, and allegiance to him.
In discoursing further from this subject, I shall consider the several parts of our Lord's humiliation, as they are laid down in the Catechism, namely, 'his being born, and that in a low condition, made under the law, undergoing the miseries of this life, the wrath of God, and the cursed death of the cross; his being buried, and continuing under the power of death for a time.' What a catalogue of humiliating circumstances is here, to which the Son of God was subjected from the cradle to the grave; the consideration of all which should excite us to hate sin, the fatal cause of all, and to endear to us the merciful Redeemer, who for our sake went through all this scene to accomplish our salvation.
FIRST, The Son of God was born, and that in a low condition. Here is a wide step at first, a step from Heaven to earth; which is a mystery of infinite condescension. Take this article in pieces, and behold humiliation in every point. The Son of God was humbled in his incarnation, his conception, his birth, and the circumstances attending it.
1. The Son of God became man. To see a king become a slave, and the order of angels degraded into crawling worms, would be matter of wonder; but a greater is here, namely, God not become an angel, though that would have been infinitely below him, but a man, a son of Adam, taking the likeness of sinful flesh. Hence the apostle cries out with admiration, 1 Timothy 3:16. 'Great is the mystery of godliness, God was manifest in the flesh.' O deep humiliation! far greater than if all the creatures had been degraded to the lowest degree of existence.
2. He was conceived in the womb of a sinful woman, the virgin Mary, who, as a daughter of Adam, was certainly infected with original sin as well as the rest of his posterity. O the depth of the Son of God's humiliation! It would have been low, had the great God, the Creator of Heaven and earth, purposing to become man, been created as Adam, as it were at once, and in a perfect state of manhood. But to be conceived in the womb of a woman, was yet lower. He whom the Heaven of heavens cannot contain as God, was as man shut up for the ordinary number of months in the womb of a woman, whom he himself had made. His body was formed not of any substance sent down from Heaven, but of her's a creature, Galatians 4:4. He was 'made of a woman;' that is, his body was formed of a part of her substance, being of the seed of David, and of the tribe of Judah. He was born of a sinful creature, and yet without sin; the Holy Spirit having purified it from all defilement, as God alone can bring a clean thing out of an unclean, though man cannot.
3. He was born of a woman. Had there been no more about him but that he had been born of an empress, a sovereign princess, who made a great figure in the world, it would have been very wonderful: but that he was born of any woman at all, be her rank in life what it will, may well strike us with amazement. I shall say no more of this, but that our birth is such as the due consideration of it might humble us all our life; and yet to it Christ humbled himself. O the depth of his humiliation.
4. He was born in a low condition. There were several circumstances of the lowest abasement about the birth of Christ. He was not born of a great princess, seated on a splendid throne, and attended with a brilliant court, but a mean woman, though of the seed-royal of David, and married not to a mighty potentate, but a poor mechanic, a carpenter, Luke 1:48 and that not in her own house, but in that of another; not in the inn, the great house where the richer and more noble company chose their lodging, there being no room there for him who was born King of the Jews, yes, who is the Prince of the kings of the earth, but in a stable among cattle; and when born, not clothed with embroidered or costly garments, as the children of kings use to be, but swaddled in tattered clothes, rent pieces of a garment, as the original word signifies; and laid not in a servant's bed in the stable, but in a manger, out of which the cattle eat their provender, instead of a cradle, Luke 2:7. A far lower state of humiliation than most of the sons and daughters of Adam are reduced to. Well may we cry out with astonishment, How low, O Son of God, were you humbled in every circumstance relating to your conception and birth! O that we might study humility from your low abasement!
SECONDLY, Our Redeemer was made under the law, though he be the Lord of all, and the Lawgiver unto his rational creatures. Rebellious man had shaken off the yoke of his obedience, and Christ therefore lays his neck under it. He submitted himself to the ceremonial law, undergoing the painful operation of circumcision on the eighth day after his birth, as was therein enjoined; to the civil law paying tribute, etc; and to the moral law, obeying the precepts thereof, and suffering the penal sanction of it, which was added in case of transgression by man, in whose room he substituted himself.
1. He submitted to the preceptive part of the law as a covenant of works, which man had broken: and this he fulfilled, so that he was even subject to Joseph his supposed father, and to Mary his Mother, according to the flesh, Luke 2:51; nay, to every branch of it, in fulfilling all righteousness, Matthew 3:15. By this his obedience the law was magnified and made honorable, and got its full due in respect of active obedience, which it could never have got from men, though all their pieces of obedience had been accumulated into one sum.
2. He submitted to the threatening or penal sanction of the law. Though there was no deceit found in his mouth, and he owed the law nothing, as being the great Lawgiver, yet the law took him by the throat, as the undertaker for sinners, saying, 'Pay me what you owe.' The threatening was enacted, and he answered it to a tittle, bearing that death in his soul and body which it had threatened on account of sin. And thus he took on the debt of elect sinners, and he paid it to the utmost farthing. O wonderful condescension in the Lord and Lawgiver, to yield obedience to his own law, that was made for creatures, in all its demands, the most rigorous not excepted? O blessed Undertaker, who have paid all the debt of bankrupt men!
THIRDLY, He underwent the miseries of this life, which was infected with the plague of sin, and thereby rendered very grievous to bear; and yet he, though sinless, humbled himself to bear the tokens thereof. As,
1. Poverty: 'Though the foxes had holes, and the birds of the air had nests, yet he, the Son of man, had not where to lay his head.' Adam had reduced all his posterity to beggary, and Christ submitted to the poverty following it; not having with which to maintain himself, but receiving supplies from some women who ministered to him of their substance. He was so poor that he had not with which to pay the tribute exacted of him until he wrought a miracle for it. In his greatest state, and when attended with the grandest cavalcade, he was mounted, not on a horse finely caparisoned, but on a silly donkey, and that none of his own, but borrowed from another.
2. Sorrow: Isaiah 53:3. He was 'a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.' There was a constant cloud of sorrow on him. Once we read of his rejoicing in spirit, but never of his laughing; frequently of his complaints, tears, and groans. He was content to sorrow for us, that we might rejoice, and to weep that we might be glad.
3. The indignities of the world, in the contempt, reproach, and despite poured upon him. He was despised and rejected of men. Hence he says of himself in this respect, Psalm 22:6. 'I am a worm and no man: a reproach of men, and despised of the people.' He was contradicted of sinners, called Beelzebub, a madman, a wine-bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners, etc.
4. The temptations of Satan. He was tempted of the devil forty days in the wilderness and elsewhere: may tempted to self-murder, and to the worship of that damned spirit, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. And Satan seems to have often set upon him, though the particular times are not mentioned in the sacred records; as appears from Luke 4:13 where it is said, that 'the devil departed from him (after his grand temptation) for a season;' denoting that he would attack him again.
Lastly, The sinless infirmities of human nature. He was subjected to weariness, hunger, thirst, etc. as the history of his life in the evangelists abundantly declares. Thus low was the Son of God humbled on account of sinners, that they might not perish forever. O let us admire his humiliation and abasement, and let his low estate forever hide pride from our eyes, and teach us, in whatever state we are, therewith to be content.
FOURTHLY, He underwent the wrath of God. Thus he humbled himself to drink the bitter dregs of his Father's wrath for us. The curse of the law was laid upon him, and he bore it for us, Galatians 3:13. His soul was troubled, John 12:27. He was beset with sorrows of the deepest sort, when he said, 'My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death,' Matthew 26:38. He was in an agony, so as it made him sweat great drops of blood, that trickled from his blessed body in a cold night in the open air. Whence was all this but from the load of his Father's wrath that lay on him, on account of all the sins of his elect people imputed to him? a load, which, if laid on all the angels in Heaven and men on earth, would have sunk them to the lowest Hell. Compare the martyrs quietly bearing the most fearful deaths. They were supported by divine consolations flowing into their souls, without one drop of God's wrath in the cup given them to drink. But from him all divine comforts were withheld. See that desertion of God of which he so bitterly cried out on the cross, when there was an eclipse of comfort from his holy soul, as there was of the sun in his cheering beams from the earth, that he might bear that wrath in full measure. O what an amazing step of humiliation was this! Who knows the power of the Lord's wrath? If fatherly anger made David to roar, and vindictive justice devils to tremble under the fearful apprehensions of the wrath to come upon them, how dreadful behooved that wrath to be which was due to the sins of all the elect, when accumulated in one sum, and all charged upon Christ at once? He was set up as a mark against which all the arrows of the divine wrath were leveled; the quiver thereof was emptied upon him. No wonder then that he was in agony, that blood trickled from every pore of his body, and that his holy human soul recoiled, as it were, from the terrible shock it underwent under this load of wrath and the curse of the law.
FIFTHLY, He underwent the cursed death of the cross. Being betrayed by Judas, forsaken by all his disciples, denied by the self-confident Peter, and condemned by Pilate, he was put to death on the cross. This death of Christ was,
1. Most painful. No death is without pain. But his death was most painful: for 'it pleased the Lord to bruise him.' Consider here,
(1.) Our Lord was scourged, having his blessed back beaten with sharp rods, Matthew 27:26 which was a most shameful and painful thing.
(2.) He was crowned with thorns; and the mad soldiers struck him on the head, when this prickly crown was on his head, thereby driving the thorns into it, and making them penetrate the deeper, Matthew 27:29, 30 whereby it seems he was so overspread with his own blood, that Pilate thought him already an object of commiseration, and brought him forth to the Jews, saying 'Behold the man,' John 19:5. Add to this what he suffered from blows and cuffs laid on him without mercy, and their compelling him to bear his own cross, until, fainting with the heavy load and his inward sufferings, they obliged another to drag it to the place of execution.
(3.) He was crucified; which was a most painful and excruciating death. For consider,
[1.] The extending of his body on the cross, which lying on the ground, his body was with such force stretched out its full length, that his bones were drawn out of joint, as he himself pathetically expresses it in prophetic language, long before the tragical event took place, Psalm 22:14. 'My bones are out of joint,' His sinews were distended, and his bones dislocated by the violent distension.
[2.] The nailing of the body so extended unto the cross. These nails were driven through the hands and the feet, the sinewy and most sensible parts of the body; which could not but occasion greater pain to Christ's body, which was of a finer temperature and more acute feeling than the bodies of other men, as being entirely exempted from the corruption and distempers these are liable to. And great indeed it seems they were; for he says, 'they pierced my hands and feet;' in Hebrew they dug them, as it were with spades and mattocks, which could not but occasion the most excruciating and acute pain.
[3.] What dreadful pain behooved the lifting up of the cross, with him nailed to it, be to his blessed body, especially if done with a sudden jerk, which we may suppose to have been probably the case, considering the eagerness of his enemies to have him dispatched; and then thrusting it down again into the ground that it might stand upright, attended no doubt with shaking from side to side? Every one may well perceive what dreadful pain must have attended all this horrid scene.
[4.] It was a longsome or lingering death. He hung on the cross about six hours, from nine in the morning until three in the afternoon, Mark 15:25, 34. What pain behooved to attend such a long suspension on the cross, his blessed body hanging all the while by his hands nailed to the upper part?
2. His death was most shameful and ignominious, Hebrews 12:2. 'He endured the cross, despising the shame.' Much shame was cast upon him. They spit upon him, and mocked him. The death of the cross was a death for bondmen, seldom for freemen, and those only of the baser sort, and for some of the highest Crimea. While he was a-dying he stood naked on the cross; for they that were crucified were first stripped naked of all their clothes, Matthew 27:35. He was crucified in the midst of two thieves, as if he had been the chief of them, and that without the gate, as the blasphemer was without the camp. They wagged their heads at him. He was mocked in his prophetic office: they blindfolded him, and bad him 'prophesy who smote him.' He was mocked in his priestly office, 'He saved others, but himself he cannot save.' And he was mocked in his kingly office; they cried unto him, 'Hail, King of the Jews;' and this title, 'This is Jesus the King of the Jews,' was inscribed on his cross, as giving him out for a mock monarch.
3. It was a cursed death, Deuteronomy 21:23. 'He who is hanged, is accursed of God.' That was but a ceremonial curse, but it was a real one to him, Galatians 3:13. 'He was made a curse for us.' There were many other kinds of death among the Jews; but that kind only was accursed: and therefore it behooved Christ our Surety so to die. It is thought this crucifying of criminals was forbidden in the time of the Emperor Constantine.
SIXTHLY, He was buried, so that there might be full assurance given of his death, upon the reality of which the hopes and happiness of his people depend, in as much as thereby transgression was finished, an end put to sin, reconciliation made for iniquity, and everlasting righteousness brought in. He was buried too, that he might conquer death in its darkest and strongest hold, even in the gloomy recesses of the grave: to sanctify and sweeten it to all his friends and followers, that it may be to them a place of repose, where their bodies may rest until the resurrection; that his people may have power and strength to bury sin, so as it may never rise up against them to their condemnation; and to teach his followers to give one another's dead bodies a just and decent interment.
The persons who concerned themselves in our Lord's funeral, were Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, John 19:38–42. They were rich men, senators, and counselors in the Jewish state, and of as bright and distinguished characters as any who sat in the Sanhedrin; and yet they were so far from reckoning it a dishonor, that they counted it a piece of singular glory to be employed in this last act of kindness to their dead Lord. Now, when the apostles were all fled, and none of them appeared to show this respect to their Master, Providence stirred up these two great and rich men to act a part upon this occasion which was truly great and honorable. And those persons were well affected to our Redeemer. Though the weakness of their faith moved them to conceal their profession during his life, yet now, when he is dead, and none of all his followers have the courage to own or concern themselves about him, they boldly appear in acting this part of sincere friends to him.
The place where our Lord was buried was a new sepulcher in a garden, wherein no man had ever been laid, John 19:41. Thus our Lord was buried not in his own, but in another man's grave. As in the days of his life he was in such circumstances, that he himself said, 'The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man has not where to lay his head;' so when he was dead he had no grave of his own to be laid in. When he was born, he was born in another man's house; when he preached, he preached in another man's ship; when he prayed, he prayed in another man's garden; when he rode to Jerusalem, he rode on another man's donkey; and when he was buried, he was buried in another man's grave. He had nothing peculiar to himself but his cross; which no man would touch, far less take from him, even when he was ready to faint under the weight of it, until Simon of Cyrene was compelled to bear it. The grave belonged to Joseph of Arimathea, who was a rich man; and thus there was a memorable fulfillment of that prophecy, Isaiah 53:9. 'He made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death.' Though upon the cross he was insulted and despised, yet he was honorably laid in the grave. It was a new grave; which a wise Providence so ordered, that the Jews might have no ground to surmise, either that some other buried before had risen, or that his resurrection was not the effect of his own power, but of virtue flowing from the body of some saint formerly interred there, as in the ease of that dead man, who being let down into the grave of Elisha, and touching his bones, revived, and stood up on his feet, 2 Kings 13:21. This grave was in a garden; which Joseph contrived to have so, that it might be a memorandum to him, while living amidst all the pleasures and products of this garden, to think of death, and to be diligent in preparing for it. In a sepulcher in a garden Christ's body was laid. In the garden of Eden death and the grave received their power, and now in a garden are conquered, disarmed, and triumphed over. In a garden Christ began his passion, and in a garden he would rise and begin his exaltation. Christ fell to the ground as a corn of wheat, John 12:24 and therefore was sown in a garden among the seeds, for his dew is as the dew of herbs, Isaiah 26:19; yes, he is the fountain of gardens, Canticles 4:15.
As to the manner of our Lord's funeral, several things may be observed.
1. Joseph, inspired with an undaunted courage, went to Pilate, and boldly asked the dead body of Jesus. Though while our Redeemer lived, Joseph was so far sunk under the power of fear and cowardice, that he acted only as his secret disciple, yet now when he is dead, holy boldness and courage rose to such a pitch in his spirit, that he openly asked his body of Pilate, in order to a decent interment. Though he might have formed a party to have carried it off by violence, yet he rather chose to do it in a regular and peaceable manner; and therefore made a dutiful application to Pilate, who was the proper person to be addressed on this occasion, in regard he had the disposal of the body. In things wherein the power of the civil magistrate is concerned, due regard must be had to that power, and nothing done to break in upon it.
2. Upon this application, Pilate very readily granted Joseph the body of Jesus, in order to its being decently interred. Perhaps by this step he imagined to do something towards atoning that guilt with which his conscience charged him in condemning an innocent person. But whatever might be in this, it is certain, that, in Joseph's petition and Pilate's ready grant of it, honor was done to Christ, and a testimony borne to his integrity.
3. Joseph having obtained his desire, instantly repaired to the accursed tree, from which he took down the body of Jesus; and mangled and macerated as it was, carried it in his arms to a place proper for its being dressed. Thus did he act under the prevailing conduct of the deepest and dearest love to his Redeemer.
4. Our Redeemer's body being brought into some adjoining house, it was washed from blood and dust, and then wound in linen with spices, as the manner of the Jews was. But why did Joseph and Nicodemus make all this ado about the body of Christ? Though perhaps in this their management we may discern the weakness of their faith, for a firm belief of the resurrection of Christ the third day would have saved them this care and cost, and have been more acceptable than all spices; yet herein we may evidently see the strength of their love, together with the value they had for his person and doctrine, which was no way lessened by the reproach of the cross.
5. The time of our Lord's burial was on the day of the preparation, when the Sabbath drew on; and this was the reason that they made such haste with the funeral. Though they were in tears for the death of Christ, yet they did not forget the work of an approaching Sabbath; but set themselves with all convenient speed and care to prepare for it.
6. The company who attended our Redeemer's funeral, was not any of the disciples, but only the women who came with him from Galilee, who, as they stayed by him while he hung upon the cross, so they followed him all in tears, beheld the sepulcher where it was, which was the way to it, and how his body was laid in it: and all this they were led to, not by their curiosity, but by their affection to the Lord Jesus, which was strong as death, cruel as the grave, and which many waters could not quench.
7. The Redeemer's funeral was actually solemnized; for after all the above circumstances were over, then they acted as is related, John 19:41, 42. 'Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulcher, wherein was never man yet laid. There laid they Jesus therefore, because of the Jews preparation day, for the sepulcher was near at hand. 'There laid they Jesus,' that is, the dead body of Jesus. Some think that the calling of that Jesus intimates the inseparable union between the divine and human natures in his blessed person. Even this dead body was Jesus a Savior; for his death is our life. Thus, without pomp or solemnity, is the body of Jesus laid in the cold and silent grave. Here lies our Surety arrested for our debt: so that if he be released, his discharge will be ours. Here is the Sun of righteousness set for a while to rise again in greater glory, and set no more. Here lies a seeming captive to death, but a real conqueror over death. Yes here lies death itself slain, and the grave conquered: 'Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.'
SEVENTHLY, Our Redeemer continued under the power of death for a time. 'For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, Matthew 12:40. For clearing the import of Christ's continuing under the power of death for a time, consider,
1. That death has a very strange and strong power in the world, which invades and prevails against all the children of men. 'For what man is he who lives, and shall not see death?' says the Psalmist. This interrogation plainly imports, that no man, high or low, great or small, rich or poor, can possibly cover himself from the stroke of death. And no wonder; for as the apostle tells us, 'death has reigned from Adam,' Romans 5:14. The empire of death has made a universal spread through the face of the earth, and, with an unrelenting fury, bears all the sons of men before it. And it is no way strange it be so, seeing it acts under the conduct of Heaven's irrepealable decree, 'It is appointed unto men once to die,' Hebrews 9:27.
2. That the empire, power, and dominion of death, was introduced into the world by sin, Romans 5:12. 'By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. The wages of sin is death.' And therefore man no sooner gave into apostasy from his Maker, but the awful sentence went forth, 'Dust you are, and unto dust shall you return,' Genesis 3:19.
3. That our Lord Jesus Christ, the Prince of life, fell under the power of death, and that in its most frightful and amazing form: for he died the painful, the cursed, the shameful, and lingering death of the cross; and this he did not by constraint, but with the utmost cheerfulness.
4. That it was for the sins of his elect people that the Lord of life came under the power of death. Their sins were imputed to him: 'He was made sin for us,' says the apostle, 'who knew no sin.' Because their sins were imputed to him, therefore death, the punishment of sin, came upon him. He was not only wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities, but he died for our sins. He bare the sins of many; and for the transgressions of his people was he stricken, yes, stricken even unto death.
5. That though our Redeemer continued under the power of death, yet it was only for a time. Though this king of terrors brought the King of glory down to the gloomy shades of the grave, yet he could not hold him long there. Hence the apostle says, Acts 2:24. 'God loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should be held of it.' Christ was imprisoned for our debt, and thrown into the hands of death; but divine justice being satisfied, it was not possible that he should be detained there, either by right or by force; for he had life in himself, and in his own power, and had conquered the prince of death.
6. That the time of our Redeemer's being under the power of death was only until the third day. For he rose the third day after his death: which was the time he had often prefixed, and he kept within it. He was buried in the evening of the sixth day of the week, and rose in the morning of the first day of the following week; so that he lay in the grave about thirty-six or thirty-eight hours. He lay so long to show that he was really and truly dead, and no longer, that he might not see corruption.
If it should be asked, What were the reasons and ends of this amazing humiliation of the Son of God? I answer, That Christ humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
1. That he might satisfy divine justice in the room and stead of an elect world. When man by sin rebelled against his rightful Lord, incensed justice called aloud for vengeance upon the attrocious offender; and had its rigorous demands been answered, all the race of mankind had perished in the depths of death and damnation forever. But Christ, by the whole scene of his humiliation, has so fully answered all its demands of his chosen, that it can crave no more. For he by his obedience and satisfaction, as the Surety of unjust sinners, has so perfectly paid all their debt, that justice is completely atoned and pacified. Hence our Redeemer drew his last breath on the cross with these words, 'It is finished.'
2. To confirm and seal his testament. He had bequeathed many great and glorious legacies to his chosen; all which had failed forever, if by his death he had not ratified and confirmed this his testament, 'For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator lives,' Hebrews 9:16, 17. Wherefore, that our Lord's testament might in that respect be made good, he sealed it with his heart's blood: 'This cup,' says he, 'is the new testament in my blood,' That is, the new testament, which is ratified by my blood.
3. To conquer and subdue the devil. This malicious and subtle enemy of mankind had by his craft and power brought the whole race of Adam in subjection to his empire, reigning over and leading them captive at his pleasure. But our Lord through death destroyed him that had the power of death. It is true, the crucifying of Jesus was the devil's plot; for he put Judas upon betraying him, the Jews upon accusing him, Pilate upon condemning him, and the soldiers upon executing him. But our Lord outshot him in his own bow, and snared and took him in his own hands. Thus the devil, by plotting and pushing on the death of the Son of God, to prevent his own ruin, procured and promoted it.
4. To finish transgression, and put an end to sin, yes, to take away sin with all its direful effects, Romans 8:3. 'For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin condemned sin in the flesh.' For when an elect world lay sunk under the guilt of sin, captives under the power of it, vile under the pollution of it, undone under the weight of it, and most miserable under the baneful effects of it, Jesus humbled himself to the death on purpose to rescue and deliver them from all this. 'We have redemption through his blood,' says Paul, 'even the forgiveness of our sins, according to the riches of his grace.' And says another apostle, 'The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin.'
5. To deliver his people from the curse of a broken law, and the wrath of God. 'Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us,' Galatians 3:13. 'Jesus which delivered us from the wrath to come,' 1 Thessalonians 1:10. When all the curses of the law were marching forth, as it were in battle-array, against the children of Adam, and the dreadful wrath of an Almighty God was ready to pour in upon them, then did our Lord step in, and, by his deeply debased birth, life, and death, divert the furious storm from his chosen, so that not one curse, or the least drop of wrath, shall ever fall to their shave.
6. Lastly, That in due time he might bring all his people to the complete possession of immortal glory. When he saw them wallowing and sinking in the depths of sin and iniquity; when he saw them exposed to eternal death and damnation by reason of sin, and when he took a view of them as absolutely unable to do anything towards their own relief and deliverance, his soul pitied them, and his affections of compassion yearned upon them; so that in their stead he satisfied divine justice, subdued their enemies, abolished sin and death, rescued them from Hell and wrath, and prepared for them eternal life and glory,
I shall conclude with a few inferences.
1. Here see the love of Christ in its most distinguishing glory. For the deeper he debased and the lower he humbled himself, the higher did he raise, and the more clearly did he manifest his love. What heart can conceive, what tongue can express, the greatness of this love! It is love without a precedent or parallel. It passes knowledge.
2. Here see the awful and tremendous severity of divine justice, which no less could satisfy than the Son of God's humbling himself, and becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Its resentment against sin swelled so high, that nothing could appease it, or move it to let go the criminal offenders, until the Son of God fell an expiatory sacrifice to it. And when the time of its acting this bloody tragedy upon our Redeemer came on, it would not forego nor abate one tittle of its demands. It would not spare him in one article of suffering which it could exact of him.
3. See here the prodigious evil of sin. Though the generality of men look upon it with a very light and easy eye; though they account it a very small matter to break in upon the divine law, and to transgress the bounds which the great God has fixed therein; yet whoever duly reflects upon the deep humiliation and sorrowful sufferings of Christ, will entertain quite other thoughts about it. Of all evils sin is infinitely the worst. Though a holy and just God has given many severe and terrible testimonies of his displeasure against sin, yet none of them appear with such an amazing awe as that which appears in the humiliation, death, and sufferings of his dear Son.
4. Let this look the pride of our hearts out of countenance; and let us think nothing too mean or low for us, whereby the glory of God and the good of others may be advanced. For Christ humbled himself deeper and lower than any ever did or can do, to procure the favor of God to sinners, to magnify the divine law and make it honorable; and therein has left us an example, that we should follow his steps.
5. Let this teach you highly to prize the salvation purchased by Christ, and offered to sinners in the gospel. Say not of the sufferings of Christ, by your slighting the redemption thereby procured, What needs all this waste? Surely sin must be of a more malignant nature, the justice of God more exact and rigorous, souls more precious, and salvation and mercy more difficult to obtain, than is ordinarily imagined. Take a view of Christ in his amazing humiliation and heavy sufferings, and see if you can entertain those thoughts.
6. Let impenitent sinners and rejecters of Christ tremble. Was this done in the green tree, what shall be done to the dry? If Christ, when he became a sinner only by imputation was exposed to such heavy sufferings as would have sunk millions of men and angels, what shall be the fate of those who Spurn at his love, reject the offers of his grace and mercy, and refuse to accept of his salvation? What can they expect, but that the wrath of God shall come upon them to the uttermost, and they shall undergo the sorest punishment that incensed and insulted justice can inflict?
7. Accept of Jesus Christ as he offers himself in the gospel. He is willing to receive sinners, nay, the very worst and most abandoned of them, or he had not swam through a sea of blood to catch them. O! be not despisers, but cheerful and willing receivers, of him who has written his love and good will to you in characters of blood.
8. Revenge the death of Christ on your lusts and idols. Give no quarter to, nor suffer them to live, that were the cause of his most humiliating and ignominious death. To cherish any sin or lust, is a high indignity done to the Son of God, and as it were a crucifying him afresh. O! then fly from every sin, account it your enemy, and Christ's enemy; and show your love to the Redeemer, who humbled himself so deeply for you, by doing whatever he commands you, and avoiding all appearance of evil.
9. Lastly, Grudge not to part with anything for Christ. He left the bosom of his Father, laid aside the robes of his glory, and exposed himself to the severest hardships and most intolerable sufferings, that you might not perish forever! and will you refuse anything for his sake? You have no reason to shift his cross, or decline to take on his yoke, when he suffered on the accursed cross to procure your deliverance from everlasting wrath and burnings.
OF CHRIST'S EXALTATION
PHILIPPIANS 2:9, 10, 11.—Wherefore God also has highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in Heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
HAVING spoke to the several parts of our blessed Redeemer's state of humiliation, I come now to treat of the several branches of his exaltation, or that high dignity and glory to which he is exalted, as the reward of his suffering even unto death. This bright Sun set as it were in a cloud, but he rose again, surrounded with the brightest rays of the most exalted glory and splendor. This exaltation is held forth very expressly in the text, which, as it is opposed to his death, includes his resurrection, or releasement from the grave. God has not only exalted him, but super-exalted him above the earth in his ascension. The name above every name which is given him, is the same in effect with his sitting at the right hand of God. The bowing of the knee is that acknowledgment of this power, dignity, and authority of Christ, by angels, men, and devils; the great evidence of which shall be at the last day, Romans 14:10, 11. 'We shall all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ.' For it is written, 'As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.'
In discoursing further from this subject, I shall consider the several steps of our Lord's exaltation, as they are laid down from the scriptures in our Catechism, namely, 'his rising from the dead on the third day, his ascending up into Heaven, his sitting at the right-hand of God the Father, and his coming to judge the world at the last day.'
I. The first step of his exaltation was his resurrection, his rising out of the grave. Concerning this, consider the following things.
1. The nature of it. His resurrection was not the re-uniting of his divine to his human nature, for death had not separated that union, as I have formerly shown; but his re-uniting his soul to his body, taking that life again which he had before laid down, John 10:17. And it was the very same body for substance which was crucified; it was the very same body that fell under death that rose again. It had been laid in the grave mangled and macerated with blows, stripes, and wounds; but in his resurrection the deformity thereby occasioned was removed, and nothing but the prints of the nails remained; as appears from John 20:25, 27.
2. The truth of his resurrection. Christ truly rose again. This truth was attested by the soldiers who guarded the sepulcher, as you will find, Matthew 28:11–15 though the elders took care to smother the effect thereof. His friends bore the most ample testimony to it; such as the women who came to anoint his dead body, his disciples and many others. To these, 'he showed himself alive after his passion, by many infallible proofs,' Acts 1:3. And we are told, 1 Corinthians 15:6 that 'he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once.' The evangelists are unanimous in this matter. This truth is also manifest from the person's being God, who could not be confined in a grave, and the many miracles wrought to confirm it, evincing him to be alive, and reigning in glory.
3. The necessity of his resurrection. It was necessary he should rise from the dead.
(1.) That the scripture might be fulfilled, 1 Corinthians 15:4 which cannot be broken. See Psalm 16:10. 'You will not leave my soul in Hell (the state of the dead); neither will you suffer your holy One to see corruption.' This passage is expressly applied to the resurrection of Christ, Acts 2:31 and 13:35. And it was prophesied of him: Isaiah 53:10. 'He shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.' A notable type of it was Jonah's coming out of the whale's belly, Matthew 12:40.
(2.) In respect of the dignity and glory of his person. He was the true God and eternal life. How was it then possible, that he should be held by death? Acts 2:24.
(3.) In respect of his Mediatory office, which would have been broken if he had not risen again. He was to reign forever, Psalm 45:7. Luke 1:32; to intercede as a Priest for over, Psalm 110:4 and therefore to enter into the holiest of all, after he had expiated our sins by his blood.
(4.) In respect of our salvation. If Christ had not risen, all the elect's hopes of Heaven had rotted in the grave forever: 1 Corinthians 15:17. 'If Christ be not raised, (says the apostle), your faith is vain; you are yet in your sins.' His resurrection was the life of his death, and had he not by his resurrection overcome death; it would forever have devoured us also.
4. The time of his resurrection, the third day. He was crucified on Friday afternoon, and he arose early on the first day of the week, which has from that event been called the Lord's day, and observed as the Christian Sabbath in all the churches of Christ. This period was long enough to confirm the truth of his death. His body did not corrupt in the grave, Psalm 16:10. Acts 13:37. Nor was it ever after mortal, but put on immortality, Romans 6:9. 'Christ being raised from the dead, dies no more; death has no more dominion over him.' This was one difference between Christ's resurrection and that of Lazarus, who rose again only to a mortal life.
5. The author of his resurrection. The resurrection of Christ is ascribed to himself, and we are firmly to believe that he rose by his own power, John 2:19. 'Destroy this temple, (says he), and in three days I will raise it up.' John 10:17. 'I lay down my life, that I might take it again.' And this the scripture insists upon as an argument of the divinity of Christ, Romans 1:4 where he is said to be 'declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead:' which must needs be thus understood; for Lazarus also was raised; yet no such thing followed on it. It is ascribed also unto the Father, Romans 6:4. But there is no inconsistency here: for whatever the Father does, the Son also does the same, the external works of the Trinity being common to each person. The reason why Christ's resurrection is ascribed to the Father, is, that he acted therein as a judge, letting out the prisoner when the debt was paid.
6. The manner of our Lord's resurrection.
(1.) It was ushered in with a terrible earthquake, Matthew 28:2. 'Behold, there was a great earthquake.' As the earth shook and trembled at our Lord's passion, so did it also at his glorious resurrection from the dead. This was an extraordinary and miraculous shaking of the earth, proceeding immediately from the divine power, as the eclipse of the sun which happened daring his passion. It was a sign of triumph, and a token of victory, by which our Lord intimated to the whole world, that he had overcome death in its own dominions, and lifted up his head as a glorious conqueror above all his enemies. He came out of the grave with great solemnity, and marched out of the bloody field with a pomp and majesty becoming the dignity of Heaven's champion.
(2.) Christ in his resurrection was attended by some of the courtiers of Heaven, Matthew 28:2. 'An angel of the Lord descended from Heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.' Christ's power was not confined to the grave or the earth, but extended to Heaven and all the host of it. Though the chief priests and Pharisees conspired together to keep him close shut up in the grave, sealed the stone which was rolled to the door of it, set a watch, and made all things as sure as they possibly could, yet one of the heavenly host by a touch baffled all their measures. The angel of the Lord rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it. This action speaks a secure triumph over all the obstructions of Christ's resurrection. He sat on the stone, defying all the powers of Hell to roll the stone to the grave again: and he sat as a guard to the grave; for having frightened away the enemy's black guard, he sat expecting the women to give them an account of our Lord's resurrection, as he very pathetically did, verse 6. 'He is not here: for he is risen, as he said: come, see the place where the Lord lay.'
(3.) He laid aside all the ensigns of mortality and death: for he stripped himself of the grave-clothes, and left them behind him, John 20:5, 6, 7. The reasons of this laying them aside might be these.
[1.] Because he rose to die no more. Lazarus came out with his grave-clothes on, because he was to die again; but Christ rising to an immortal life, came out free from all these encumbrances.
[2.] Because he was going to be clothed with robes of glory.
[3.] He left these clothes in the grave, as it were for the use of his people. For if the grave be a bed to the saint!, he has thus sheeted it, and made it ready for them, that in it they may lie quietly and easily until the morning of the resurrection, when they shall enter into the full and eternal possession of the glory that is to be revealed. These grave-clothes were found in very good order; which shows that his body was not stolen away when the watch slept, as the chief priests and elders foolishly bade them say. Robbers of tombs have been known to take away the clothes and leave the body; but none ever took away the body, and left the clothes, especially when they were made of fine linen and new.
(4.) Christ's resurrection was attended with that of many others, Matthew 27:52, 53. 'The graves were opened, and many bodies of saints which slept arose, and came out of their graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.' Here observe,
(1.) Who they were that rose. They are expressly called saints, persons sanctified by the Spirit and grace of God: for such only shall rise by the virtue and power of Christ's resurrection. Who they were, whether the ancient patriarchs, the Old Testament martyrs, or more modern saints, who lived in Christ's time, but died before him, cannot be determined.
(2.) That their number was considerable; they are called many. The benefits of our Lord's resurrection extends to many.
(3.) The time of their rising was posterior to Christ's resurrection. For though before this the earth did quake, the rocks rend, and the graves were opened, yet none of them stirred out of these dark mansions until Christ was risen. It is in virtue of Christ's resurrection, that the bodies of all the saints shall in the fullness of time rise again.
(4.) They went into the holy city, and appeared unto many. They did not appear to all the people, but to many; but whether friends or enemies, in what manner they appeared, how often, what they did and said, and how they disappeared, are secret things not to be known. It is very probable, however, that the great design of their appearing to so many was to bear testimony to the truth and certainty, to the power and glory of our Redeemer's resurrection.
[5.] What became of these saints afterwards, is a question not easy to be determined. Some are of opinion, that as they rose only to bear witness of Christ's resurrection to those to whom they appeared, so having finished this their work, they retired to their graves again. But it seems to be more agreeable both to the Redeemer's honor and theirs, to suppose, that they rose, as he did, to die no more, and therefore ascended with him into glory.
7. The fruits of Christ's resurrection. Among many, I only name the following.
(1.) It is an argument of his having made complete satisfaction to the justice of God for the sins of his people, John 16:10. When the just Judge opens the prison door, it says that the prisoner's debt is fully paid, and he has received satisfaction for all demands from him. Christ's resurrection was in effect a discharge of all the debt he had taken upon him to pay.
(2.) It is an argument, that the bodies of the elect shall be raised at the last day, 1 Corinthians 15:20. 'Now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept.' If Christ has risen, the power of death is broken. And the same Spirit dwells in his members, Romans 8:11. And all the benefits of the covenant shall be made forthcoming, seeing he is alive to become executor of his own testament.
(3.) The duty of believers flowing from this is to walk in newness of life, Romans 6:4. They are to rise from the grave of sin, and to put on the robes of true holiness. Dead sinners are not fit members of a living head.
II. Christ ascended into Heaven, the seat of the blessed. Concerning this, let us observe,
1. In what respect he ascended. Not in respect of his divine nature, for that can change no place, and is confined to no place; but in respect of his human nature, which is so present in one place, that it cannot be in another at the same time, and it changes one place for another by local motion. It was his human body that ascended into Heaven, and which the heavens must contain until the restitution of all things.
2. The reality of his ascension. He did not merely disappear, but by a local motion went up from the earth into the highest heavens, leaving the one, and going to the other. And he ascended in a visible manner, before the eyes of his disciples.
3. The time of it, which was forty days after his resurrection, Acts 1:2, 3. This his long stay on the earth was the blessed effect of his matchless and unparalleled love to his church and people. Though ineffable glory was prepared and waiting for him in Heaven, yet he would not go to possess it until he had ordered all things aright that concerned the good of his followers here on earth. More particularly, he stayed so long on earth,
(1.) That he might the more convincingly testify unto his disciples the truth of his humanity, and confirm them in the faith of his being truly man.
(2.) To confirm them still the more strongly in the faith of his resurrection from the dead. This was a truth which the disciples were not easily induced to believe. Hence when they first heard it from Mary Magdalene, and the other women that had been at the sepulcher, it is said, that 'their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not,' Luke 24:11. But his staying so long on the earth, and frequently conversing with them, gave them full assurance of the reality of his resurrection. He showed himself alive to them by many infallible proofs. He walked and talked with them, ate and drank with them. He again and again showed them the marks of the wounds in his hands, and feet, and side; which was the utmost proof the thing was capable of or required. Besides, it was not one or two, but many proofs which he gave them of this; for he was seen by them forty days; not indeed constantly residing with them, but frequently appearing to them, and bringing them by degrees to be fully satisfied of the truth of his resurrection.
(3.) To instruct them more clearly and perfectly in the knowledge of the mysteries of his kingdom, which after his departure they were to preach and propagate through the world. He had given them a general idea of that kingdom, and of the time when it should be set up, in the parable of the vineyard, Mark 12; but upon this occasion he let them more clearly into the nature of it, as a kingdom of grace in this world, and of glory in that which is to come: and no doubt opened to them that covenant which is the great charter by which it is incorporated. Thus our Lord did not entertain his disciples with discourses about politics in the kingdoms of men, about philosophy in the kingdom of nature, but about pure divinity and his spiritual kingdom, which were matters of greatest concern, both to themselves and to those to whom they were in a little time to preach.
4. The manner of our Lord's ascension.
(1.) He ascended not figuratively and metaphorically, but really and corporeally, by a local translation of his human nature from the earth to the highest heavens. He ascended from a mount, an high and eminent place, to ascertain his disciples of the truth of his ascension. He did not withdraw himself from them as at other times, but ascended openly in the view of them all, they looking steadfastly toward Heaven as he went up. He ascended from the Mount of Olives, that he might enter on his glory near the place of his sufferings, and the last tragical scene of his life. It was at this mount that his heart was made sad; for there he began to be sorrowful and sore amazed: and it was there also that his heart was made glad, and filled with ineffable and triumphant joy. The same place afforded him a passage both to his cross and to his crown; for there his sorrows and sufferings began, and from thence he ascended into Heaven.
(2.) He ascended while he was blessing his disciples. He blessed them as one having authority; yes, commanded the blessing upon them. And while he was so employed, he was parted from them, to intimate that his being so did not put an end to his blessing them, but that this privilege was to be continued with them by virtue of his powerful intercession for them in Heaven. The first tidings of our Redeemer's birth were attended with praises to God and blessings to men: he began his public ministry with pronouncing blessings on certain characters, Matthew 5; when he died, he breathed out his soul in blessings to his enemies, 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do;' and just when he was leaving the world, he was translated with a blessing in his mouth.
(3.) He ascended powerfully, even by his own almighty power. As by the power of his eternal Godhead he broke through the gloomy shades of the grave, and rose again to an immortal life; so by the same almighty strength he went gloriously up through the yielding air into the bright regions of eternal light. Enoch and Elijah were both translated soul and body into Heaven; but this was not by their own, but by a divine power which exerted itself upon that occasion, by the ministry of angels. But our Redeemer went up upon the wings of his own almighty power.
(4.) He ascended softly and gradually. Though his conduct in this matter could not but strike with a strong surprise upon the minds of his disciples, yet his motion was so plain, easy, and distinct, that it fell very clearly under their observation; for while they beheld he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight.' Thus he departed by little and little, and not in a rapturous haste.
(5.) He ascended in a glorious and triumphant manner.
[1.] There was a cloud prepared as his royal chariot to carry him up to his princely palace. A cloud, in the natural notion of it, is a thick and moist vapor, drawn up from the earth or sea, by the heat of the sun, to the middle region of the air, where it is condensed, congealed, and thickened, by the coldness of the place, and so hangs or moves like a huge mountain in the midst of the air, partly from natural causes, the sun or the wind, but especially by supernatural ones, the mighty power and appointment of God, who is said to use the clouds as princes do horses of state or chariots of triumph to ride on. Thus he descended in a cloud to Moses, and proclaimed the name of the Lord, Exodus. 34:5: and it is said, Isaiah 19:1. 'Behold, the Lord rides upon a swift cloud.' We find the clouds were serviceable to our Redeemer: for a bright cloud overshadowed him at his transfiguration; he was carried up in a cloud to Heaven at his ascension; and at the last day the clouds will be the chariots which will bring him to judgment. Hereby Christ discovered himself to be the Lord of all the creatures. He had already trod upon the earth, walked upon the sea, vanquished Hell and the grave; and now he makes the clouds his chariots, and rides upon the wings of the wind.
(2.) In his ascension he was attended with a bright and blessed retinue of glorious angels. These angelic spirits graced the solemnity of his birth with anthems of triumphant joy; they ministered to him at the conclusion of his forty days' temptation by the devil; when he was exposed to his amazing agony in the garden the evening before his crucifixion, they waited on him; and now, when he is making his triumphant entrance into glory, their presence adds to the glorious solemnity of the happy day. To this we may add, that it is not an improbable supposition, that on this grand occasion he was attended with the company of those many saints that rose from the dead after his resurrection; whom he carried along with him, not only to grace the solemnity of his ascension, but as the first-fruits of his triumph over death and the grave, and a demonstrative evidence that the rest should follow in due time.
(3.) He went to Heaven as a glorious conqueror, triumphing over all his enemies. 'When he ascended upon high,' says the apostle, 'he led captivity captive,' Ephesians 4:8. As conquerors of old In their solemn triumphs used to lead their captives fettered with iron chains: so Christ having spoiled principalities and powers, made a show of them openly, triumphing over them, Colossians 2:15. Some think that at Christ's ascension there was some real visible triumph, some open pomp and show, in which the devils were led as chained captives through the air: which was visible, not to all, but to God, the angels, and the spirits of just men made perfect. But whatever be in this, it is certain that Christ fought and overcame all his enemies: he gave them the last blow upon the cross, he seized on the spoil at his resurrection, and led them in triumph at his ascension into Heaven, and by his peaceable possession of his throne his subjects enjoy the benefit of all.
(4.) He ascended into Heaven with shouts and acclamations of great joy, Psalm 47:5. 'God is gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet.' Hence,
(1.) His ascension was celebrated with the acclamations of angels. If they sang so cheerfully when they came to proclaim his birth, O what shouts and jubilations were heard among them when they accompanied him in his triumphant entrance into Heaven! The whole city of God was moved at his coming; the very heavens resounded, and echoed their acclamations of joy. Hence is that passage, Psalm 24:7. 'Lift up your heads, O you gates; and be you lift up, you everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in.' The entry of a mighty and victorious prince is there described; and so it is proper unto Christ: they applaud him there as a mighty conqueror, newly returned from the spoils of his enemies.
(2.) The blessed saints make the like applauses, as the prophet describes it, Isaiah 63:1, 2, 3. 'Who is this that comes from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah? this that is glorious in his apparel, traveling in the greatness of his strength? I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. Wherefore are you red in your apparel, and your garments like him that treads in the wine-fat? I have trodden the wine-press alone, and of the people there was none with me: for I will tread them in mine anger, and trample them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my clothing.' There is here a dialogue between Christ and the saints, to express their acclamations at his victory. They are represented as filled with admiration at his glorious triumphs over all his enemies: and they celebrate his victorious return from so bloody a battle, like a great and valiant general, gloriously adorned with rich robes and royal apparel, and besprinkled with the blood of his implacable enemies.
(3.) God testifies his approbation of what Christ had done, by giving him a kindly welcome home to Heaven, Psalm 110:1. 'The Lord said unto my Lord, sit you at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool:' As if he had said, 'Your work is well done, Son, you are welcome home to glory; sit now at my right hand,' etc. And on this account it is said, Daniel 7:13. 'I saw in the night visions, and behold, one like the Son of man, came with the clouds of Heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near before him.' This vision of Christ was accomplished in his ascension. The holy angels bring him to the Father, called here, 'the Ancient of Days,' who gloriously rewards him for his toil and travel on earth, and his bloody sufferings in accomplishing the work of man's redemption, and receives him as it were with open arms, rejoicing exceedingly to see him again in Heaven; and therefore he is said to be 'received up into glory,' 1 Timothy 3:16.
(5.) He ascended into Heaven in a most munificent manner, bestowing many royal gifts and blessings upon his people. Hence says the apostle, Ephesians 4:8. 'When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men.' The apostle here refers to Psalm 68:13. 'You have ascended on high, you have led captivity captive; you have received gifts for men; yes, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them.' There is here an allusion to the ancient customs of princes or generals, who, after some glorious achievements, or victories, used to mount their triumphant chariot, and enter into their royal cities attended by their captive enemies, and afterwards to distribute gifts to their subjects and soldiers. Thus Christ, at his glorious ascension, when he entered Heaven with solemn triumph, bestowed many rich and inestimable gifts upon men, to fit and qualify them for the work of the ministry, and to edify his mystical body. Some of these gifts were extraordinary, as the gifts of tongues and miracles, which were necessary and very useful in the first ages of Christianity. Others, again, were ordinary, and are to continue to the end of the world. And these are of various kinds. To some he gives depths of learning and a profound judgment; to others a gaining elocution; to some a mighty pathos, and melting influence upon the affections, and to others a forcible power of arguing. But they are all designed to gain souls to Christ, and promote the interests of his kingdom.
5. Why, or for what ends Christ ascended into Heaven.
1. That he might be solemnly inaugurated and installed in glory. This was due unto him by Mediatory compact. He was to drink of the brook in the way, and therefore should he lift his head. This was the order that God appointed for his exaltation. The combat was to precede his triumph. He was first to suffer, and then to enter into glory. Hence we read, 1 Peter 1:11 that 'the Spirit did testify beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.' His triumphant laurel grew upon the thorns of his cross, and received a verdure from his dying tears. The palms spread in his way at his entrance into Jerusalem a little before his death, are regarded by some as an emblem of this, it being the nature of that plant to grow and increase the higher by the weights that are hung upon it. For so did our blessed Lord rise to a more glorious and triumphant height by his heavy pressures.
(2.) To make way for the Spirit. For if Christ had not gone away, the Comforter had not come. This plentiful effusion of the Spirit was very necessary to fit and qualify the apostles for propagating the gospel through the world. Such weak and illiterate men as they generally were, could not have managed so great a work without a mighty magazine of divine eloquence and vigorous courage. It was therefore needful that our great High Priest should enter into the holy place, and appear before God with the blood of his sacrifice; that the treasures of the Spirit might be opened, and that the divine flame might issue out thence to inspire them with abilities for so great an undertaking.
(3.) To plead and make intercession for his people. After he had shed his precious blood on the earth for the expiation of their sin, he rose again from the dead, and went up into Heaven as their Advocate and Intercessor, that, by virtue of his meritorious sacrifice, he might answer all the charges brought against them, and sue out all the good things promised to them.
(4.) To prepare mansions of glory for all his followers, John 14:2. These were indeed prepared for them from all eternity, in the immutable purpose and decree of God, and from the foundation of the world by his creative power. But they were further prepared by Christ's ascension. And this lies in the following particulars.
[1.] By this he set open the gates of Heaven, that poor sinners might enter in. He removed all the bars and obstructions that were in the way, and made a patent passage for them into glory.
[2.] He has as a public person taken possession of the celestial kingdom in their name. On this account he is called 'the forerunner,' Hebrews 6:20.
[3.] He prepares it for his people, in his sanctifying and purifying it for them. This was typified of old by the sprinkling the tabernacle, and all the Vessels of the sanctuary, with the blood of the sacrifices. Hence it is said, Hebrews 9:23, 24. 'It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into Heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.' We are not to think that Heaven was polluted, and so under any necessity of being made clean: but the cry of man's sin had ascended up on high, as it were with a stinking savor; and therefore Christ behooved to go up and perfume it with his precious merit.
[4.] He prepares it for his people, in providing and fitting all things for their entertainment against they come; as Joseph was sent into Egypt to prepare for his father Jacob.
Lastly, The duty that this lays on all that pretend interest in Christ.
(1.) Let our hearts be there where our Lord is. Hence is that exhortation, Colossians 3:1, 2. 'If you then be risen with Christ, seek those things that are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth.' Let us not be pursuing earthly things as our treasure, but live in this world as those whose heads are homeward, to the house prepared by their ascended Lord.
(2.) Let us thence be encouraged to encounter with magnanimity and courage all difficulties that we may meet with in our Christian course and warfare; knowing that we shall be conquerors at last through him that loved us. Christ fought his way to the glory promised him through legions of armed hosts; and so must we, if we would be conformed to him as our Head: he has reached to the crown as the reward of his obedience and sufferings; and so shall we if we follow on in his strength: 'Let us,' therefore, 'lay aside every weight, and the sin which does so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,' Hebrews 12:1.
III. The third step of our Lord's exaltation, is his sitting at the right hand of God.
This phrase, 'the right hand of God,' Hebrews 1:3. Mark 16:19. Ephesians 1:20. 1 Peter 3:22 is not to be taken properly but in a figurative sense. For God being a pure Spirit, is void of all bodily parts. When it is said, that Christ sits at God's right-hand, it is a borrowed expression, wherein the Lord is pleased to condescend to the weakness of our capacities, to the end we may form suitable thoughts of that glorious and exalted state into which Christ is advanced in the heavens. The phrase is wholly metaphorical, taken from the custom of kings and princes, who use to place those at their right hands, and next to themselves, upon whom they would confer the chief marks of favor and honor. More particularly, the right hand denotes,
1. Majesty and honor. It is the place we confer upon those we highly esteem. Thus, Solomon placed his mother at his right-hand, when he was set on his royal throne, 2 Kings 2:19. And it is said of the church, the spouse of Christ, to denote the honor that he puts upon her, that 'she is at his right-hand,' Psalm 45:9. 'Upon your right-hand did stand the queen in gold of Ophir.' So God, in testimony of the great honor and esteem that he puts upon Christ as Mediator, has set him at his right-hand, which on this account is called 'the right-hand of the Majesty on high,' Hebrews 1:3.
2. His power. Hence says the Psalmist, Psalm 77:10. 'I said, This is my infirmity: but I will remember the years of the right-hand of the Most High.' There we find God's power under the metonymy of a right hand, opposed to the infirmity of his servant. 'My infirm and weak faith (says Asaph) made me apt to sink under the weight of Heaven's displeasure; but when I called to mind my sweet experiences of the divine power which had been exerted for my deliverance in former distresses, this revived my spirit, and refreshed me again.
Christ's 'sitting at the right-hand of God,' implies the following things.
1. A state of rest, Micah 4:4. 'They shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig-tree.' Christ had a troublesome life while in the world; but now that he has finished the work the Father gave him to do, 'he has forever sat down at the right hand of God,' Hebrews 10:12 and is thereby set beyond the reach of men and devils. While here, they would give him no rest from his cradle to his grave; bat now they may tear his picture, and persecute his members, but they cannot reach his person.
2. Continuance in that state, 2 Kings 7:3. 'Why sit we here until we die?' said the four leprous men at the gate of Samaria. The days of sorrow that he met with on earth shall never recur; his crown shall flourish on his head, and his kingdom stand firm and be established.
His 'sitting at God's right hand' denotes,
1. The accomplishment of that work, and the consummation of all those offices, which he was to perform on the earth for the redemption of elect sinners. For until all this was finished, he was not to return to his glory. 'For he who has entered into his rest, has ceased from his works, as God did from his,' Hebrews 4:10.
2. The great delight and satisfaction that the Father had in Christ, and in that glorious work which he had finished. When he returned from earth to Heaven, the Father welcomed him with the greatest testimony of satisfaction and joy, 'Sit you on my right hand,' etc. Psalm 110:1.
3. The great honor and dignity to which he is advanced in Heaven. While he was here on earth he veiled his divinity with the infirmities of the flesh, and lived in a mean and low condition: but now he is exalted to the highest honor. In this respect he has bestowed more honor on his own Son as Mediator, than ever he did on any creature: for, as it is said, Hebrews 1:13. 'To which of the angels said he at any time, Sit you at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool?'
4. His being invested with sovereign dominion and supreme authority and power. 'God has highly exalted him, and given him a name above every name,' Philippians 2:9, 10. 'He has set him at his own right-hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, etc. 'You made him a little lower than the angels,' that is, in respect of his state of humiliation on the earth; 'you have crowned him with glory and honor, and set him over the works of your hands, and have put all things in subjection under his feet, Hebrews 2:7, 8.
It is Christ as Mediator that sits at the Father's right hand. With respect to his divine nature, which in the days of his flesh was as a bottle in the smoke, apparently sullied and veiled, it now breaks forth in all its essential glory and splendor. And with regard to his human nature, which while tabernacling here bore the likeness of sinful flesh, and had nothing more engaging in it than that of other men to outward aspect, it has attained a glory far superior to all creatures, even the very angels being made subject to the man Christ.
The ends for which our Redeemer sits at the right hand of God are these following.
1. That, as a mighty King, he may protect and defend his church and people, against the rage of all their enemies, both temporal and spiritual, Isaiah 32:1, 2; Deuteronomy 33:26, 27.
2. That he may subdue all the enemies of his kingdom and people, the devil, with all his retinue, the world, the flesh, sin, and Hell, Psalm 110:1. Acts 2:36. Hebrews 10:12, 13. 1 Corinthians 15:25.
3. That with royal munificence he may dispense unto all his faithful subjects all those gifts and graces that may qualify them for the fruition of that glory that is to be revealed, Acts 5:31.
4. That he may act the part of a powerful Intercessor for them, Romans 8:34.
5. That all his friends and followers may with him be translated into Heaven, and advanced unto a glorious state, being made kings and priests unto God, Ephesians 1:4, 5, 6. Revelation 3:21.
USE. Behold here the great difference between our Redeemer's state while here on earth, and what it is now in Heaven. How wonderfully is the scene changed! When he was on earth, he lodged in a stable, but now he reigns in a royal palace. Then he had a manger for his cradle, but now he sits in a chair of state. While here he was hated and scorned by men, but now he is adored by angels. Here his name was reproached and reviled, but there he has a name above every name. Here he was a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; but now he is anointed with the oil of gladness, and filled with inexpressible delight and joy. While here he seemed to have no form or loveliness why he should be desired; but now he is manifestly the brightness of his Father's glory, and the express image of his person. Here he lay groveling upon the ground, sweating drops of clotted blood; but there he sits upon a royal throne, surrounded with many myriads of holy angels. Here he groaned, but there he triumphs; here he was crucified, but there he is crowned.
2. Behold how highly our nature is dignified and ennobled, in the person of our Redeemer. It is far exalted above that of the angels; and these glorious spirits bow the knee to him who is bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh.
3. This lets us see that the redemption of lost sinners, that was brought about by the death of Christ was very pleasing unto the Father. The great dignity and honor that is now conferred upon him, speaks a fragrance in his satisfaction to God, as well as a fullness of merit for the sons of men.
4. Then we should draw near to him in all the duties of worship, with the most awful reverence and deepest prostration of soul, such as becomes the glory and dignity of his adorable Majesty. Let us have grace whereby we may serve him acceptably, with reverence and godly fear.
5. Then let this exalted Savior have your hands and your heart. Will you deny him a lodging in your souls, to whom the Father has given to sit on his right hand? The rejecting of Christ in his humble estate, was grievously punished on many individuals, and occasioned the destruction of the Jewish church and nation. And shall you escape, if you reject him now in his exalted and enthroned state? It is better that our hearts be his throne, where he may sway his scepter in a way of mercy and grace, than that we be made his footstool in wrath.
6. Let this settle and compose the hearts of the Lord's people, with respect to the state of religion, and the interests of Christ's kingdom among men. Christ is seated on his throne, and will see to his interest in the world. Zion's God and King reigns, Isaiah 52:7. If Christ be on his throne, all his enemies shall be destroyed. As sure as he reigns King forever, so sure shall Antichrist be degraded and hurled from his throne, and all the rags he has left behind him in the Protestant churches be burnt up.
IV. The last step of our Lord's exaltation, is his coming to judge the world at the last day. As I discoursed to you of this formerly, I shall be the briefer now. I shall endeavor a little to consider,
1. The manner and circumstances of Christ's coming to judge the world.
2. The Judge.
3. The parties to be judged.
4. The matters about which they are to be judged.
5. The properties of it.
6. The final causes of the judgment.
FIRST, I am to consider the manner and circumstances of Christ's coming to judge the world.
1. He shall come with observation, in the view of the whole assembled world: for all the kindreds of the earth shall on that day see this mighty Personage with their bodily eyes. None of all the sons and daughters of Adam can possibly avoid this wonderful sight. 'Behold he comes with clouds, and every eye shall see him, and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him,' Revelation 1:7.
2. Though he shall come with observation, or in a visible manner, yet he will do so very suddenly and surprisingly. As the universal deluge found the old world sleeping in the deepest security, so at the second coming of Christ the sinners of the last times will be drenched in slumbering stupidity, as is plain from Matthew 24:37, 38, 39. In short, the coming of a thief to break a house, is not more surprising to those in it, than Christ's coming to judgment will be to sinners. Hence the apostle says, 1 Thessalonians 5:2. 'Yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night.'
3. He will come very seasonably, at the very precise point and period of time fixed upon in the eternal councils of Heaven. When once that memorable moment begins, he will delay no longer, but instantly rend the heavens, and come down, 2 Peter 3:9, 10.
4. He will come very terribly. In that day the radiant rays of his majestic glory will break out with such an awful brightness, as will cause convulsions of the most formidable horror in the breasts of the ungodly. See Revelation 6:14–17.
5. He will come gloriously: for 'then shall they see the Son of man coming with great power and glory,' Mark 13:26. To evince this, consider,
(1.) That this coming will be ushered in with that which our Lord himself calls 'the sign of the Son of man,' Matthew 24:30. What this sign of the Son of man is, interpreters are not agreed. Some take it to be Christ himself, others the burning up of the world, others the sound of the last trumpet, and the Papists the cross. But I think none of these can be the sign of the Lord Christ coming to judgment. I rather incline to follow the opinion of a judicious divine, who gathers what the sign of the Son of man is from Matthew 24:27. 'For as the lightning comes out of the east, and shines even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be;' that is, with infinite brightness and splendor will he come at that day. When he appears the second time without sin unto salvation, such rays of radiant brightness will set upon and shine from his body, as will darken all other lights, and awaken the drowsy world to look for his coming. Now, that such a brightness will encompass and shine from our Redeemer's body, we have no reason to doubt, seeing at his transfiguration upon the Mount 'his face did shine as the sun, and his clothing was as white as the light,' Matthew 17:2. Now, all this beauty and brightness that appeared on our Redeemer's body at his transfiguration, was but a type and figure of that refulgent splendor which will shine from it in that day when he will come to judge the world in righteousness. And this matchless and marvelous brightness we may presume to be that which he himself calls 'the sign of the Son of Man.'
(2.) When our Lord comes, the whole frame of nature will suffer the most fearful convulsions, and at last be rolled up in a universal flame, Psalm 50:3. Daniel 7:9, 10. When once this mighty flame breaks out, it will burn with the keenest fury, and lay the earth, with all its works, in heaps of ruinous rubbish, 2. Peter 3:10.
(3.) At his coming he will be attended with a splendid retinue of ten thousand times ten thousand glorious angels. The flaming seraphims, those mighty ministers of his who fulfill all his pleasure, shall in a magnificent body form a majestic cavalcade, when the Prince of the kings of the earth comes to judgment, Matthew 16:27. 2 Thessalonians 1:7. Dan 7:10.
(4.) When he comes, he will sit upon a throne high and lifted up; and before him shall the general assembly of men and devils, be solemnly seated, Matthew 25:31, 32. Revelation 20:11, 12.
SECONDLY, I come now to speak of the Judge. And this is the Lord Jesus Christ. 'For, (says the apostle) we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ,' 2 Corinthians 5:10. Now, he is ordained Judge of the world.
1. Because this Judgment is to be acted visibly. Men are to be judged, and the whole process with them will be for things done in the body. Now God is invisible in his nature, and therefore has most wisely ordained the last judgment of the world to be transacted by a visible person. The Son of God will appear in his human nature, seated on a visible throne, that he may be seen and heard of all.
2. Because Christ is only qualified for this office.
(1.) On account of the great dignity and excellency of his person, being God-man. No mere creature is capable of so high a trust, and such a glorious commission. To pass a sovereign sentence upon angels and men, is a royalty reserved for the Son of God alone,
(2.) On account of the immense difficulty of this work. No mere creature is able to discharge it. If a select number of the holy angels of the highest order were deputed for this purpose, they could not manage the judicial trial of one man. For, besides the innumerable acts and omissions in one life, the secret springs of the heart, from whence the guilt or goodness of moral actions is derived, are not open to them. It is he alone who discerns all things that can require an account of all.
3. He is constituted Judge of the world, as a reward of his death and bloody sufferings. So the apostle declares, Philippians 2:8, 9, 10. His victorious sufferings are the titles to his triumphs. His being so ignominiously condemned by men, is the just reason of his advancement to this dignity and glory. This will forever roll away the ignominy of his cross.
THIRDLY, Who are they that shall be judged? All must appear before Christ's tribunal. Men of all conditions in the church, apostles and private Christians, ministers and people, old and young, the good and the bad, believers and unbelievers, the just and the unjust, Jews and Gentiles, bond and free. Men of all conditions in the world must stand before Christ's bar, high and low, rich and poor, noble and ignoble, princes and peasants. No rank, degree, or quality, can exempt men from this appearance. All the distinctions which are among men here cease at the grave's mouth. All stand there on the same level, and are of the same mold. In a word, all the apostate angels and the universal progeny of Adam, shall appear before Christ at that day.
FOURTHLY, What are the things about which men shall be judged? We learn from 2 Corinthians 5:10 that 'they are the things done in the body.' And they are these three, works, words, and thoughts.
1. All men's works will come unto judgment, whether they be good or bad, Ecclesiastes 12:14. 'God will bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.' All their good works will then be tried, as acts of piety towards God, and acts of righteousness and charity towards men, with respect to their principle, motives, and end. All men's evil works will be tried in judgment, both open and secret. Many dig deep now to hide their counsels from the Lord, and carry their wickedness under a veil of darkness, and care not what they do, provided they do it undiscerned. There are many abominations committed in men's lives, which the eyes of the world cannot penetrate into; and there are innumerable evils lurking in their hearts, which no tongue can disclose. But at the last day all those things will be brought to light, such as midnight revels, secret murders, fraudulent dealings, and hidden hypocrisies.
2. All men's words shall be tried in judgment. God gave not the power and organ of speech to man, which is his glory and excellency above the beasts, to serve a sinful passion or corrupt humor, or to vent the froth and vanity of his own spirit, but to extol and magnify his Creator, and render him the praise of all his glorious and admirable works. Christians should employ their tongues for the honor of God, and the edification of one another. But O how woefully is this noble faculty abused by many, in cursing and swearing, lying, slandering, and detracting, and by belching forth obscene and scurrilous speeches! The lips of many drop nothing but gall and poison, to infect and corrupt others. Now, all this must come into judgment. Our Savior tells us, that every idle word that a man speaks, he shall give account of it in the day of judgment.
3. All men's thoughts will be tried in judgment. For Christ will 'make manifest the counsels of the heart,' 1 Corinthians 4:5. Many think now that thoughts go free; but it is not so in God's account. He knows all men's thoughts, and records them in the book of his remembrance, and at the last day they will be manifested and revealed. O what an infinite variety of thoughts is in every man's mind? This thinking faculty is never idle, but is always putting forth whole shoals of thoughts. Men have many atheistic and blasphemous thoughts, many murdering and revengeful thoughts, covetous and ambitious thoughts, unchaste and impure thoughts, vain, empty, and unprofitable thoughts, and many bold presumptuous thoughts. Now, all these must come into judgment.
FIFTHLY, What are the properties of this judgment?
1. It will be a universal judgment. Those that lived under the law, and those that lived under the gospel, and those that having no law were a law unto themselves, Romans 2:12 those that had many talents, and they that had but one, must all appear at Christ's bar. Those that were carried from the cradle to the grave, and those that stooped for age, the father and the child, the master and the servant, in a word, the whole offspring of Adam, will be judged at that day. The affections of the earth, the bottom of the sea, and all the elements, shall give up their dead; and all the apostate angels shall then appear and receive their final doom.
2. It will be an awful judgment. It is called in scripture 'the judgment of the great day.' The immediate antecedents of Christ's appearing will make it very terrible. There will be a dreadful catastrophe of the world, which will fill men's hearts with horror and fear; the bands and ligaments of nature will then be broken asunder, and her present frame and constitution dissolved; the elements shall be reduced into their primitive confusion: the sun shall be darkened, the moon shall not give her light, the stars shall fall from Heaven, and the powers of Heaven shall be shaken, Matthew 24:29. There will be a strange convulsion of nature at the coming of the Lord. All the stately palaces and magnificent buildings which men doat so much upon now, will then be reduced to ashes. Again, the manner of his coming will be awful and solemn: 'For the Lord himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord,' 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17. This will be such a shout as armies were accustomed to make when the signal of battle was given; and after this shout the trumpet of God shall sound. By this tremendous blast sinners shall be affrighted out of their graves; but to the saints it will carry no more terror than the roaring of cannons, when armies of friends approach a besieged city for the relief of those that are within it. And the dead being raised, they shall be gathered together before the great and awful throne on which Christ shall sit in his glory, and there they shall be exactly divided by the angels into two companies, one on the Judge's right-hand, and the other on his left. Here will be the greatest assembly that ever met; where Adam may see his numerous offspring, even as the sand upon the sea-shore, which no man can number.
3. This judgment will be exact and critical. It is the Searcher of the heart, to whom all secrets are known, that will pass this final sentence upon men. His eyes are as a flame of fire, and can penetrate into the center of the soul. All sins, whether secret or open, shall be accounted for at that day; and the sins of men's thoughts and affections, which Satan could not accuse them of, shall then be brought into judgment. For in that day 'God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ,' Romans 2:16. All men's sins of omission, and their woeful neglect of improving the means, advantages, and opportunities for doing or receiving good, shall be accounted for at that day. All acts of commission in youth and age, whether gross sensuality, as licentiousness, lusts, excess of wine, ravelings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries, and all excess of riot, shall be accounted for to him who is ready to judge the quick and the dead, 1 Peter 4:4, 5. And all acts of unrighteousness to men, yes, and sins of lesser guilt, for which the most part of men are not touched either with grief or shame while here, shall then be produced in judgment. And all the sins of men's words, which are so easily committed, but not so easily observed, shall be called to a heavy remembrance. This will be a day that will perfectly fan the world. Justice will then hold the balance in an even hand; Christ will go to work so exactly, that some divines have thought, that the day of judgment will last as long as the day of the gospel's administration has done or shall do.
4. It will be a righteous judgment; 'He will judge the world in righteousness,' Acts 17:31. His knowledge of all men's characters and actions is infallibly true, and therefore his sentence upon them will be incontestibly just, consistent with all the rules of the highest equity and justice. And the sentence he shall pass upon both saints and sinners, shall be universally applauded at that day.
5. Lastly, It is a final judgment, from which there can lie no appeal. Here in the world, if men judge themselves wronged in one court, they can appeal to another. But it is not so here: for this is the supreme tribunal, where the great Sovereign of Heaven and earth will give judgment upon angels and men: and the sentence once passed, will immediately be put in execution, Matthew 25:46. Just after the sentence is pronounced by Christ, it is immediately added, 'These shall go away into everlasting punishment; but the righteous into life eternal.' The sentence shall be irrevocable, and can never be repealed. It will determine the eternal state of all, and transmit them either to everlasting happiness or misery.
SIXTHLY, What are the final causes or ends of this judgment?
1. The glory of the justice and mercy of God; the former in punishing the wicked, and the latter in rewarding his friends. Many eminent displays of these attributes have been exhibited in the world, but the largest and fullest manifestation of them will be given at the last day, when the righteous judge 'shall take vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ; who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power,' 2 Thessalonians 1:8, 9. And then he shall say unto the righteous, 'Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, Matthew 25:34.
2. The glory of the Lord Jesus, which will be highly manifested at that day. His first coming was obscure and without observation. For he came in the form of a servant, and was reproached and reviled by men. But then he will come in power and great glory, as the Lord and Heir of all things. At his first coming he veiled his divinity with the infirmities of flesh. But then the rays of his incomprehensible glory shall dazzle the eyes of all that behold him.—When he came first to the world, he stood before the tribunals of men, and was condemned to the cursed death of the cross; but then he will sit upon a glorious throne, and all the princes and potentates in the world shall stand trembling before him, expecting a sentence from his mouth, upon which their eternal destiny will depend. He is now seated at the right-hand of the Majesty on high; but the curtains of the heavens conceal his glory from us; and therefore there is a time fixed, when in the sight of the whole world he will manifest his glory.
3. The rewarding of men according to their works, and thereby vindicating the providence of God from the imputation of unrighteousness in his governing the world.—Things seem to be carried with an unequal balance in the present life. The wicked prosper, as if they were rewarded for being evil; and the godly suffer, as if they were punished for being good. Yes, the virtuous and the vicious are equally miserable here. In common calamities, there is no difference between the righteous and the wicked. There is no peculiar antidote to secure them from pestilential infection; there is no strong retreat to defend them from the sword of a conquering enemy: they have no secret provisions in time of famine; for the wheat and the tares are bound in a bundle, and cast into the same fire: yes, often the godly are in the worse condition, and merely on account of their goodness. They are daily oppressed, because they do not make resistance; and loaded with sufferings, because they endure them with patience. They are for God's sake made the spectacles of extreme misery, while the insolent defyers of his majesty and laws enjoy all manner of visible felicity. And therefore, for the vindication of his justice, there must be a day of retribution, wherein God will reward every man according to his works. Divine justice requires that there should be a different procedure with those that differ among themselves; that it should be well with them that do well, and ill with them that do evil; and that every man should reap according to what he has sown.
USE 1. Labor to get a firm belief and persuasion of this great and awful truth. Alas! the most part of men are so busied about the affairs of this present life, that they do not mind the future. These awful words, death, judgment, and eternity, make no more impression upon their hearts, than if they were words of no signification. This is a truth of the greatest importance, and therefore is clearly and plentifully revealed in the holy scripture. Hearken then to the voice of this heavenly oracle, and believe and tremble at the thoughts of this awful day.
2. Think frequently on this terrible judgment, that the belief of it may be powerful on your hearts and lives. One great cause of men's woeful neglect of duty is the want of serious thoughts concerning Christ's second coming. This renders them lazy and secure, so that they make no provision for it: but where it is firmly believed, and duly thought upon, O how active and diligent does it make them! It had this effect on Paul, 2 Corinthians 5:9, 10, 11. Many put this day far away, and set it at a remote distance from them; and this makes them stupid and secure. I have read of a minister, who in a sermon described the last judgment in all its terrors, with such ardent expressions, and those animated with such an affecting voice, and such an inflamed countenance and action, that his hearers broke forth into passionate cries, as if the Judge himself had been present to pass the final sentence upon them. In the height of their commotion, the preacher bade them stop their tears and passions, for he had one thing more to add, the most affecting and astonishing consideration of all the rest, namely, that, within less than a quarter of an hour, the memory and regard of that which so transported them would vanish, and their affections return to their carnal objects in their usual manner. The neglect of serious consideration makes even the doctrine of eternal judgment to become without efficacy. It is needful, therefore, that the belief of this truth be so firmly seated in the heart, that it may engage the attention of the thoughts, and may have a royal power over the will and affections, that so our lives may be ordered according to its rules. Serious thoughts of this awful day would prove the most effectual restraint from sin: and particularly it would have a notable efficacy in keeping them back from secret sins, and deprive the devil of one of his greatest advantages against men, arising from solitude and secrecy. It would be a powerful remedy against sensual temptations, which so easily ensnare the hearts of men; and would change the apprehensions of the mind, alter the taste of the appetite, and make the most enticing and irresistible lusts the objects of our greatest detestation.
3. We should fear and tremble at the thoughts of this awful day. The great ones in the world that are most powerful and unruly, may hence see that there is a power above them. Many oppose Christ and his interest now, saying, 'Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us,' Psalm 2:3. But they should remember that 'he who sits in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision,' verse 4. The day is hastening on, when he shall speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure,' verse 5. He 'will break them with a rod of iron, and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel,' verse 9. The day is coming, when he shall appear in his power and great glory, and all the opposers of his cause and interest shall be brought into court before his throne, and hear this dreadful sentence pronounced against them: 'Those mine enemies that would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me,' Luke 19:27.
4. Then this should make the saints patient under all their trials and sufferings. They have no reason to be ashamed of suffering disgrace for Christ; for he will abundantly reward them at the great day. Whatever injustice they have got from men, they will have righteous judgment from God. This should make them despise the reproaches and censures of their most malicious adversaries. There is a day appointed, wherein oppressed innocence shall obtain the noblest victory, and disgraced godliness the most public and highest honor. They may suffer under the tyranny of time, but they shall reign in the kingdom of eternity. The belief of this is enough to make them glory in the sharpest tribulations, and joy fully triumph over Satan with his perverted malignant world, Hebrews 11:25, 26. 2 Corinthians 4:17, 18.
5. Lastly, Make the Judge your friend in time, by receiving and embracing him as your only Savior, offered to you as such in the gospel; and give all diligence that you may be found in him, clothed with his righteousness, in that terrible day. There will be no standing before his awful tribunal, unless you be clothed in the garments of your elder brother; and there will be no access into the guest-chamber, unless you have on the wedding-garment of imputed righteousness. Therefore kiss the Son, and be reconciled to him, and so shall you appear before him as your Judge at the last day. Acquaint now yourselves with him, and be at peace; for thereby good shall come unto you, particularly that of a solemn acquittal in the last judgment. But if you will not now submit unto the scepter of his grace and righteousness, and subject yourselves to him as your only rightful Lord and Sovereign, willing to have him to reign over you, and to be ruled by his laws, you shall not be able to stand in judgment, but be condemned with his enemies, and have your eternal habitation in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone. Knowing therefore the terrors of the Lord, be persuaded to flee from the wrath to come, and so iniquity shall not be your ruin.
OF THE APPLICATION OF REDEMPTION
TITUS 3:5.—He saved us,—by the renewing of the Holy Spirit.
HAVING taken a view of our glorious Redeemer, in his person, incarnation, offices, and his twofold state of humiliation and exaltation, let us now proceed to consider the application of that redemption which he purchased for us by his obedience and death.
If we cast our eyes backward to the preceding words, we find,
(1.) Our wretched natural state, verse 3. 'For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.' This is a dreadful picture of the depravity and misery of human nature; in which not only Pagans, who lived without God in the world, but Jews the peculiar people of God, of which nation was Paul, were deeply involved.
(2.) Redemption purchased for us by Jesus Christ, which is the way in which the love of God to man appeared. And this redemption is as extensive as the wretched condition of man. As all mankind, both Jews and Gentiles, are by nature in a state of wretchedness, so redemption was purchased by Christ for both, and both are warranted to come to Christ for it; though none but the elect among both will obtain it And in the text we have the application of that redemption, He saved us, etc. In which we have,
1. Sinful creatures made partakers of Christ's redemption. He saved us. He speaks of himself and other saints yet in the world, whom he says God has saved, saved by virtue of Christ's death, from sin and wrath, put them into a state of, and given them a right to, eternal complete salvation.
2. How they are made partakers of this redemption.—Where we may observe,
(1.) The impulsive cause: 'not according to our good works,' these were not the moving causes of our salvation; but 'his own mercy:' the same mercy that moved him to send our Redeemer, moved him to apply the redemption purchased by him.
(2.) The way and manner of accomplishing it: By the renewing of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit makes the application of that redemption, regenerating us, whereof baptism is the sign, and so renewing and making us new creatures. Thus, Christ made the salve for our sore, by his obedience and death, and the Spirit applies it. Hence we have a proper answer to that.
Question: 'How are we made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ?'
DOCTRINE. Ans. 'We are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ, by the effectual application of it to us by his Holy Spirit.'
In handling this subject, I shall,
I. Consider the purchase of this redemption.
II. The application of it.
III. Apply the subject in some practical uses.
1. As to the purchase of redemption or salvation spoken of in the text, five things are to be considered.
I. What the redemption is. 1. It is a deliverance by payment of a price, 1 Peter 1:18. 'You were not redeemed with corruptible things,' etc. Sinners were the lawful captives of justice, Isaiah 49:24. 'Shall the lawful captive be delivered?' And without shedding of blood there is no remission. This redemption consists of two parts.
(1.) Deliverance from evil.
(2.) Restoration to the good lost.
(1.) Deliverance from sin, the chief evil, Matthew 1:21. 'He shall save his people from their sins.' This is the house of bondage which our Redeemer finds all his people in, where they are in chains held fast to their drudgery. He came to deliver them and set them free from this slavery, Romans 6:6, 7. 'Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he who is dead, is freed from sin.'
(2.) Deliverance from wrath, 1 Thessalonians 1 ult.—'Jesus which delivered us from the wrath to come.' The wages of sin being death, even eternal destruction of the sinner in Hell, all mankind were liable unto it: but now a ransom is paid, whereby there is purchased to sinners freedom from wrath, the taking off the sentence of death lying on them, whereby they were bound to everlasting misery.
2. Redemption includes in it a restoration to the good lost or a possession of all that happiness and all those blessings which men forfeited by the primitive transgression, which may all be summed up in eternal life, begun in every believer in this world, and perfected in the world of glory.
3. Who purchased this redemption. Even Jesus Christ, the Son, of God in our nature, 1 Thessalonians 1 ult. forfeited. He took on him our nature, and became our near kinsman, that he might redeem the slaves and the captives, and redeem to them their mortgaged inheritance. For he made a full redemption, not only buying sinners from under the curse, but withal purchasing for them the blessing they had forfeited. This was a work too great for any lower person: rivers of oil would not have done it; the stock of angels could not have answered this strait of mankind. But God 'laid help upon one that is mighty,' Psalm 89:19.
4. What was the ransom paid. All that Christ did and suffered for sinners comes under the name of the ransom. For he himself was the ransom, 1 Timothy 2:6. 'Who gave himself a ransom for all.' He did not give gold, money, or lands, for us; for such mean things could not have been accepted: but he gave himself for us: 'Who gave himself for me,' says Paul, Galatians 2:20. He gave body for body, soul for soul, bare our sins in his own body, and made his soul an offering for sin. And as our ransom,
(1.) He obeyed, gave punctual perfect obedience unto all the commands of the law, and so fulfilled all righteousness. Whereas we were born sinners, he was born holy; whereas we lived sinners, keeping none of the commands, he lived sinless, and kept them all. So that the law had all its demands of obedience from him.
(2.) He suffered and bare what the law threatened; and so satisfied justice in the room of sinners. Both these we have, Galatians 4:4, 5. 'When the fullness of time was come God sent forth his Son made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons,' Philippians 2:8. 'Being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.' Hence, when the scripture attributes our redemption to his blood, Ephesians 1:7. 1 Peter 1:18, 19 it is not to be understood exclusively of his obedience and other sufferings, but of his bloody death, which was the completing of the ransom; John 19:30. Jesus cried, 'It is finished:' and therefore his blood is named, as supposing the other parts of his obedience and sufferings; as if one should say, that a man is delivered from prison, by one's paying the utmost farthing for him.
5. For whom this redemption was purchased. The ransom paid was sufficient for the redemption of all mankind; but the elect only were actually redeemed; it was designed for them only; John 10:15. 'I lay down my life for the sheep.' Chapter 17:9. 'I pray not for the world, but for them which you have given me.' It is certain that many perish, and that satisfaction is exacted of themselves for their own debt; so that if Christ died for them, he so far died in vain, Galatians 2:21 as I have formerly shown at large.
II. As to the application of this redemption, consider,
1. What this application is. It is the actual interesting us in it, investing us in the possession of it, and making it effectual to us for the ends for which it was purchased; and therefore the text calls it a saving us. So the immediate consequent of this application is twofold.
1st. Deliverance from sin and the wrath of God, Romans 6:18. 'Being made free from sin.' Chapter 8:1. 'There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.' The chains of guilt binding over the sinner to God's wrath are broken off: the cords are loosed, and thrown away from the prisoner; he is freed from the slavery and reigning power of lusts, and so brought out of Satan's prison.
2dly, Restoration to peace with, and the favor of God, and to a right and title to Heaven, and, in a word, being entitled to all the benefits of Christ's purchase, and actually enjoying them in our own persons. This is the effectual application of it to us, even as a salve applied heals the sore.
2. The necessity of this application. It is so necessary that none can have saying benefit by it until it be applied, John 1:12. In contemplation of the purchased redemption, the lives of the elect are spared, and they have means of grace given them, until they be brought in to Christ. But still in the mean time they are in a state of wrath, their sins are unpardoned, and they are without actual right to the inheritance of the saints. As a remedy cannot recover a man unless it be applied; so men must die eternally, notwithstanding the death of Christ, unless his redemption be applied to them in particular, for their recovery.
3. Who applies this redemption. It is the office of the Holy Spirit to apply it. The Father sent our Redeemer: the Son purchased our redemption; and the Holy Spirit applies it, as says the text. Our Lord Jesus is the royal Bridegroom; who offers himself and all his benefits unto sinners, upon their marriage with him; it is the Holy Spirit that gains the sinner's consent, and so brings the soul to Christ, whereby it has interest in his purchase. Now,
1st. The outward means the Spirit makes use of for this end is the ministry of the word, 1 Corinthians 3:5. This is suited to the nature of rational creatures, wherein their sin, danger, and need of Christ, his ability and willingness to save are laid before them, and they are invited and persuaded to accept of the Redeemer, who thereby comes to their prison doors, offering them liberty; and to their bedsides, offering healing. And faith comes by hearing.
2dly, There is a powerful operation of the Spirit on all the faculties of the soul that accompanies it, 1 Thessalonians 1:5, 6. 'Our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and in much assurance; as you know what manner of men we were among you for your sake. And you became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Spirit.' Hereby the prison-doors are made to fly open, and the fetters to fly off, like Sampson's green withs from the devil's captive. A new light is let into the mind, the soul is made willing to be made the Lord's only, wholly, and forever, Psalm 110:3. Philippians 2:13. The conscience is quickened, the affections are spiritualized, and the whole soul is affected, so as with heart and good will to embrace Christ. And this is the proper work of the Lord's Spirit. Who else can do it? who can take of Christ's and give to poor sinners, but the Spirit of Christ? John 16:26.
4. Whom does he apply it to. He applies it to those, and those only, for whom it was purchased; that is, to the elect, Acts 13:48. 'As many as were ordained unto eternal life, believed.' The Holy Spirit knows the deep things of God, was privy to the counsel of peace that passed between the Father and the Son from eternity: the book of life is open to him, and agreeable thereto he manages his application. Such as fall away may have slight touches of the enlightening Spirit, but they never had the spirit of sanctification resting on them for this application.
The bargain between Christ and an elect soul may get many backsets; sometimes it may seem to be going fair on, and sometimes to be broken off, without hope of ever coming to again: but he will never let it blow up for altogether, but will pursue it until it be an effectual match. We may say of the Spirit in this case as Naomi did to Ruth, 'The man will not be in rest, until he have finished the thing,' Ruth 3 ult.
5. Lastly, Whether this application be completed at once or not. It is certain, that a whole Christ, with all his benefits, is at once made over to the sinner. But as certain it is, that there are many of these benefits which they are not presently put in possession of. And therefore the complete application comes not until the last day, which therefore is called our redemption-day, Ephesians 4:30. Romans 8:23. Hence the Spirit is still at work in believers carrying on this work, and will never leave it, until he have perfectly united them with him, and taken away everything that occasions distance.
APPLICATION
USE. I. Of information. This lets us see,
1. We are poor miserable creatures without Christ, Revelation 3:17. That we need to be saved, speaks us to be lost; that we need to be redeemed, speaks us to be in bondage. O, sinner! know that while you are out of Christ, you are not a free man. Nay,
(1.) You are a prisoner of justice; for you have broken the law, and you are taken and bound as in a prison and can not escape, Isaiah 61:1.
(2.) You are Satan's captive, ib. Satan made war against Heaven, and engaging with innocent Adam, took him captive, and all of us in his loins; and behold you are born and live in captivity.
(3.) You are the slave of sin, 2 Peter 2:19. You can do nothing but sin, and go the round from one sin to another; for that is the only work which Satan's captives get leave to work, Romans 6:20.
2. See the need you have of the application of Christ's redemption. You need to have an interest in Christ, to have Christ applied to your souls, as much as ever a poor captive needs the applying of a ransom, or the sick man of a remedy; without which the former must die in the pit, and the latter of his disease, without remedy. The ransom may be paid, and the remedy provided; but if they be not applied, it is all one to the captive and sick, as if there had been no ransom nor remedy.
3. See the happiness of the saints who are converted by the Spirit. Christ and all his purchase is theirs, 1 Corinthians 3:22, 23. We may say of them as of the prodigal, they were lost, but now found; dead, but now alive; prisoners, but now at liberty, etc. Their guilt is now removed, the power of sin in them is broken, and the indwelling power thereof shall be taken away. Heaven is theirs, the mortgaged inheritance is bought back, and they are infeft in it.
4. The Holy Spirit is a divine person, not a divine attribute; for it is his office to apply Christ's redemption to sinners, which cannot agree but to a person. He is the third person in the Godhead, to whom we owe the same faith, worship, and obedience, as to the Father and the Son. And therefore it is a more justifiable way of speaking of the Spirit to speak of the Spirit as a person, he, than as of a thing, it.
5. There is an absolute need of the Spirit's powerful working on our souls, in order to salvation. Redemption is purchased by Christ; but unless the Spirit apply it to us, we cannot have saving benefit by it. We cannot move towards the Lord in conversion, but as we are moved; for we are dead, and 'It is the Spirit that quickens,' John 6:63. We are in darkness, it is the Spirit that enlightens. We are wayward, and will not turn, we must be made willing in a day of power. Therefore we have much need to seek the Spirit.
6. How just is the destruction of those that resist the Holy Spirit, whose office it is to apply Christ? If men will not have a remedy applied, they must die of their disease. If a captive will not have the ransom applied to him, he must die in the pit, since he refuses to be loosed. They that fight against the Spirit in stifling their convictions, sinning against light, their damnation is most just. They run a most dangerous risk.
7. What a glorious and great work is the work of man's salvation! At the making of man there was, as it were, a consultation of the Trinity, but the work was soon done, Genesis 1:26, 27. 'Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.—So God created man in his own image.' But at the recovery of man, all hands were set to work (so to speak). The Father acts his part in choosing a certain number of the lost race to be partakers of his glory, giving them unto his Son for a people, and him to them for a Redeemer. The Son takes on their nature, and redeems them with his blood, and purchases eternal salvation for them. The Holy Spirit applies that purchase unto them, renewing their natures, quickening them, and knitting them to Christ as the Head of vital influences. O! should we not admire this great and glorious work?
8. Let the Lord himself have the glory of the conversion of souls. If it be by the Spirit that redemption is applied, then it is the Spirit himself, and not man, that makes himself to differ from others. It is not that one uses his free-will better than another, but that the free Spirit looses the bands from off the will in one, and not in another.
9. Lastly, We may hence learn the nature of the sin unto death; which, because it does in a special manner run cross to the operation of the Spirit, tending to the application of Christ's redemption to a sinner, is called 'the sin against the Holy Spirit;' and may be thus described:
It is a rejecting, opposing, and blaspheming, of Christ and the way of salvation through him, after a man has been clearly convinced of the truth, and tasted the goodness thereof, by the inward operation of the Holy Spirit, and that deliberately, and willfully, and avowedly, out of malice and despite against Christ and his Holy Spirit. Here observe,
1. The object which this sin is conversant about. It strikes against the main part of the gospel, namely, Christ and the way of salvation by him. Hence they are said to 'crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame,' Hebrews 6:6. Therefore, while one does not fly in the face of the way of salvation through Christ crucified, he cannot be thus guilty, though his sin be otherwise ever so heinous.
2. The actings of this forlorn sinner.
(1.) He rejects Christ, and the way of salvation through him. He will not be saved that way; he will rather run the risk of damnation than be obliged to Christ, or take him for his Savior. Though he should die of his disease, he will not have Christ's redemption applied to him. If he has not professed that way in time past, he downright refuses it for the time to come, Matthew 12:24. Said the Pharisees to Christ, 'This fellow does not cast out devils but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils;' intimating they would have no more to do with him then, but stand off from him, as one would from the prime agent of the prince of the devils. Or if they have professed that way, they renounce it, they 'fall away,' Hebrews 6:6 not partially, but totally, quite given up with that way of salvation. Hence no person that does not quite renounce and refuse to be saved by Christ, can be guilty of this sin.
(2.) He does not only reject it for himself, but opposes it for others, using all his endeavors to root out the gospel from the earth by word and deed, pleading against that way, and persecuting it, as he has opportunity. As did the Pharisees, and those mentioned Hebrews 6:6. They 'crucify the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.' They would do it to him personally, and actually do it to him in his members. And so those who are not arrived at this height, cannot be guilty of this sin.
(3.) He not only rejects and opposes it, but blasphemes it, reproaches and rails against Christ, and the way of salvation through him. Hence it is called 'blasphemy,' Matthew 12:31 and 'speaking against the Holy Spirit,' verse 32. So that neither are they guilty of this sin, that do not reproach and rail against the way of religion.
Now, this is horrible guilt; yet I must tell you, that a man may do all this, reject, oppose, and blaspheme Christ, and the way of salvation through him, and yet not be guilty of the sin against the Holy Spirit, though indeed they are fearful advances in the way to it. For Paul did all this before his conversion, yet 'obtained mercy, because he did it ignorantly in unbelief.' See Matthew 12:31. 'All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men.' Therefore observe,
3. The qualifications of the party to whom this sin is incident. He is one that has been clearly convinced of the truth of the gospel, and has had a taste of the goodness of it by the inward operation of of the Spirit. He plainly fights in this against his own conscience, and the witness of the Holy Spirit manifested unto him. Hence it is called 'speaking against the Holy Spirit,' Matthew 12:32 not so much against his person, as against and over the belly of his enlightening operation, not in others, but in himself. This our Lord, who knows men's hearts, discovered concerning those Pharisees mentioned Matthew 12. And Hebrews 6:4, 5, 6 is plain to this purpose.
Hence those who remain under common ignorance of the truths of the gospel, and have never had an enlightening work on them, wherein, by the inward operation of the Spirit on their souls, the gospel-way of salvation has been particularly manifested to them, both in the truth and goodness thereof; those, I say are not capable of this sin.
But for a man thus qualified to reject and blaspheme Christ, is horrible; and yet even this will not conclude a person under the guilt of this sin. For some of the saints were by Paul, when a persecutor, 'compelled to blaspheme,' no doubt against the clear light within their breasts, Acts 26:10, 11. Yet their sins were pardoned, as all the sins of the saints are. And hence we may conclude, that the blasphemies which poor souls are driven into by the horrible injections of, tossings and harassings they have from the devil, in his hour and power of darkness, cannot be the sin against the Holy Spirit, nor unpardonable. Therefore we must take in,
4. Lastly, The properties of these actings of this forlorn sinner. All this is done, Christ and the way of salvation are rejected, opposed, and blasphemed, by this sinner.
(1.) Deliberately and willfully, Hebrews 10:26. 'If we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins.' It is done out of choice, not unadvisedly, rashly, and in the hurry of a temptation, from fear or constraint. Therefore no sin of indeliberation, or weakness, or that one is hurried into against his will in any measure, or before he is aware, can be this unpardonable sin, however heinous otherwise it may be. For so Peter denied Christ, and these saints aforesaid blasphemed.
(2.) Avowedly. This forlorn sinner comes to the light with his sin; he does not commit it secretly within his own breast, but openly in the view of the world. It is an overt speech, act, or deed; as is manifest from Matthew 12:24. 'They said, this fellow casts not out devils but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils;' verse 32. 'Whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him.' Hebrews 6:6. 'They put him to open shame.' Hence it is manifest, that no thought, how horrible soever, that passes through the heart, which one is ashamed of, and sorrow for, and cannot avow, can be this sin; for that cannot be a 'putting Christ to open shame.' And,
(3.) Maliciously. He does not this of base fear, love to the world, or some such like motive; but out of pure malice against Christ his Spirit, and the way of salvation; Hebrews 6:6. They 'crucify him, and put him to an open shame.' And 10:29. 'Who has trodden under foot the Son of God,—and has done despite unto the Spirit of grace.' He is one that is downright obstinate against the Lord, maliciously rejects the way of salvation, refuses contemptuously any benefit by Christ's blood, despitefully sets himself against the Spirit in his operations for application of Christ's redemption to him. In one word, he behaves like a desperate wounded man, who tears away the plaster from his wound, and throws it at the face of the surgeon who applied it, choosing rather to bleed to death, than be saved from death by him that made it, or applied it. This is the unpardonable sin, and the unpardonable sinner, whose case is absolutely hopeless.
Hence whatever your sin be, yet if you be grieved for it, and would be content to have mercy through Christ, or desire the application of his redemption, you are not guilty of this sin.
And thus you may see how this sin becomes unpardonable, and how it is impossible to renew such again unto repentance; namely, that as the case of the sick man is desperate, who rejects the remedy, and sets himself maliciously against the physician; so that soul's case must be utterly hopeless, which maliciously, willfully and avowedly, rejects, opposes, and blasphemes Christ the only sacrifice, and the Holy Spirit the only Sanctifier. For if one will by no means have Christ, he must needs perish, for there is no other sacrifice if they despitefully refuse his Spirit, there is no other Sanctifier. How then can they be pardoned, or brought to repentance? If one sin against the Father, as a Lawgiver, the satisfaction of the Son can take away that sin; if one sin against the Son, by unbelief or otherwise, the Holy Spirit can by his grace cure him of that; but if one will needs do despite to the Spirit of grace, and maliciously set himself against his application of Christ's redemption, there is no more hope; since there is not another person in the Godhead to cure this.
USE II. Of trial. Te may try by this, whether you be partakers of Christ's redemption or not, namely, if the Spirit has effectually applied it unto you. For there is no other way of partaking of it; and this never misgives. I shall give you the following marks of the Spirit's application.
Mark 1. Where the Spirit applies Christ's redemption, the wound is fully opened, and then Christ's redemption is fully applied, Luke 6:48. 1 Corinthians 1:30. Where the work is not carried through by the Spirit, either the soul's wound is so laid open that the sinner despairs, and there is no application of Christ, as in the case of Judas; or else it is not enough opened and laid out, sins of the heart, and particularly the sin of one's nature, are not so discovered, as to convince the soul of its utter impotency to good. Hence Christ is not applied for sanctification, as well as for justification, and so not truly applied at all. But where the wound is laid open sufficiently, both in point of guilt, which the soul sees it can by no means remove, and in point of utter natural corruption, which the soul sees it cannot help; and withal the soul is brought to Christ both for righteousness and sanctification, to close with him, and depend on him for both; there the Spirit has applied Christ's redemption
(1 Corinthians 1:30.), laying the plaster to in the full breadth of the sore.
Mark 2. Where there is a begun delivery from the power of sin, the reign of it is broken, it has not the soul at its beck as before, Romans 6:14. It is true sin may prevail, because the power of it is not entirely broken, the application not being yet perfect. But the heart is habitually loosed from sin, longing to be rid of it, and endeavoring to be freed of the bonds, as the captive casting off his chains when he is coming forth of the prison, and Lazarus raised leaving his dead-clothes, Romans 7:24.
USE III. Of exhortation, in two branches.
First, Be deeply concerned for the application of Christ's redemption unto yourselves. Seek it, and be not satisfied without it. Make it your greatest care to be partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ. To press this, I offer the following motives.
Mot. 1. Consider what a great redemption it is, Hebrews 2:3. It is a redemption from the greatest evils, sin, and the wrath of God;—of the greatest benefits, peace with God, pardon, and eternal life;—performed by the greatest of persons, the Son of God; and could be performed by no lesser one, being above the reach of angels and men;—purchased by the paying of the greatest ransom, the blood of God.
Mot. 2. Some are made partakers of it. So says the text. The door of the treasure-house is opened to some, and they are brought in, and do partake of it. There have been before you, who have been dying of their wounds, as you are now, and by the application of it they have been recovered, 1 Corinthians 6:11. Up then, and put in for a shave in this glorious redemption.
Mot. 3. You need it as well as others, Ephesians 2:3. Are not you as well as others naturally justice's prisoners, Satan's captives, and sin's slaves? You cannot deliver yourselves more than others could you must perish in the pit, if you be not partakers of this redemption. And you are not able to bear the weight of wrath more than others. O let not your need prompt you on to it!
Mot. 4. It is in your offer this day. Our Lord is crying to you by the gospel, 'Turn you to the strong hold, you prisoners of hope; even today do I declare that I will render double unto you,' Zechariah 9:12. The physician is come to your bed-sides, offering you his never-failing medicines. All the benefits of Christ's purchase are offered to you. They cost him dear, but he offers them freely, though the price of blood to him: Isaiah 55:1. 'Ho, every one that thirsts, come you to the waters, and he who has no money; come you, buy and eat, yes, come, buy wine and milk without money, and without price.'
Mot. 5. You will have no saving benefit by it, if it be not applied to you, John 8:24. What will it avail you, that Christ died for the sins of his people, if you have no interest in his death? you must die for your own sins, and bear your own burden for evermore. There is a physician indeed; but what will you be the better, if you do not employ him? What though you get his directions in the gospel? If you do not make use of the remedy, you will die of your disease.
Mot. 6. Nay, it will be worse for you than if there had been no redemption purchased, Hebrews 2:3. 'How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?' Matthew 11:24. (It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom (says Christ to Capernaum) in the day of judgment, than for you.' It will aggravate your condemnation, that there was a ransom paid, and it was in your power, but you slighted it. O how fearful is the slight given to the price of blood, the blood of the Son of God! The Mediator's vengeance will pursue such. And, as a thousand worms, it will at last gnaw the consciences of those that slighted it.
Mot. 7. Lastly, It will not always be in your offer, Luke 14:24, 25. Behold, now is the day of salvation. The time comes when the market of free grace will be over, and if one would ever so gladly have it, they shall not get it. Therefore delay not. You know not but it may be out of your reach tomorrow; for you have no reason to boast of tomorrow, as you know not what a day may bring forth.
2dly, As ever you would have the redemption purchased by Christ applied to you, and would not mar that application,
1. Beware of that treatment of the Spirit, which has a tendency thereto, yes, and leads the way to the great transgression. And beware of,
1st. Resisting the Spirit, Acts 7:51 but rather fall in with him in his operations. To stave off convictions, and guard against awakenings out of a state of sin, to sin against the light, and inward checks, and to go on obstinately in sin, in opposition to calls to repentance, is to resist the Spirit. And that is most dangerous, as dangerous as for the sick man to resist the physician that would apply healing plasters to his sores, and so fight, against his own welfare.
2dly, Quenching the Spirit, 1 Thessalonians 5:19. Sometimes this holy fire begins to burn, and you may find the heat of it: O then take heed as one who is upon the point of cure, that you do not mar it! Do not cast water on this fire to drown it out, by sinning against light, putting out your convictions out of your hearts and heads, by sinning with a strong hand, or filling up your thoughts with worldly business, drowning them by sinful pleasures, etc. Withdraw not fuel from this fire, by neglecting the motions and operations of the Spirit. Do not smother it, by not giving them vent in prayer, and supplication, and confession before God, or in consulting with his servants in cases wherein you need particular direction. O, why will you ruin yourselves, and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life?
3dly, Grieving the Spirit, Ephesians 4:30. Even believers themselves have need of the Spirit for carrying on this work of application of Christ's redemption. And they are in hazard of retarding and interrupting it, by their grieving the Spirit by gross sins, which in a special manner defile the conscience, or by sins, though smaller in their nature, yet attended with great aggravations, or by not valuing and esteeming the Spirit's graces, comforts, influences, and ordinances. These things provoke the Spirit to withdraw; and so the application of the redemption is not advanced.
4thly, Vexing the Spirit, Isaiah 63:10. It is true, the Spirit of the Lord is not subject to passions; for these are inconsistent with the infinite happiness of God; and so he cannot properly be grieved or vexed, nor disturbed. But men are said to vex the Spirit, when they treat him so as would vex one capable of vexation. This is done by often falling into the same sins, Numbers 14:22 especially falling into them again after a person has been convinced of the evil of them, confessed, mourned for them, and resolved against them; and much more when, besides all this, they have smarted for them. This is the great trial of divine patience, a tempting of God, and puts men in great hazard of being given up of God, Numbers 14:27.
Lastly, Blaspheming the Spirit in his operations. This is done by mocking at religion, or the work of the Spirit of the Lord, in others: A dangerous business, as these young blasphemers felt, 2 Kings 2:23, 24. 'And Elisha went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, you bald-head, Go up, you bald-head. And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord: and there came forth two she-bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them.' Or by fathering the operations of the Spirit in ourselves or others, on some other cause, as when religion is counted folly, soul-exercise melancholy or distraction, and communion with God delusion. Thus the Spirit, as the Spirit of regeneration and of prayer, is often blasphemed.
2. As ever you would have the redemption purchased by Christ applied to you, labor to get the Spirit; make it your business to get him to dwell in you, and work in you. Lay out yourselves to be his habitation. Consider,
Mot. 1. You are by nature without the Spirit, Jude, 19 therefore you have need to seek him. The highest principle of acting in you is your own spirit, which is so corrupted that it can do nothing truly good, John 15:5. And being without the Spirit, you are without God in the world, and therefore without hope, while you are so.
Mot. 2. You can have no saving benefit by Christ but by the Spirit. You can have no interest in Christ without him, Romans 8:9 and no access to God through Christ, but by him, Ephesians 2:18. While you have not the Spirit, the redemption is indeed purchased, but, alas! it is not applied to you. Christ has died, but you have no interest in him, no saying benefit by him. There is a full treasure of grace in Christ, but, alas! you want the key to open it. The bridegroom stands ready to receive you, but there is none to bring the bride to him, and she cannot go her alone.