verily I say unto you he that heareth my words and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death unto life v. Joh. 24. let us take it for as express a declaration from God the Father as if that voice which required them to hear Jesus had said You that are obedient to my Son have everlasting life and are in no danger to perish being translated from the dominion of death to be heirs of life II. And now from the consideration of the words that were spoken let us pass to the manner wherein they were delivered which is so vastly different from that wherein God spake formerly to Moses and the children of Israel from another mountain that I cannot but think it was intended to signifie something of the grace of Eternall Life which Jesus brings to us When he was transfigured and his face shone as the Sun the Evangelist tells us moreover that his raiment became glistering exceeding white as snow and that a bright cloud also overshadowed them out of which the voice before named came saying This is my beloved Son c. Which if it be compared with former divine Manifestations of the same kind we may reasonably look upon as an indication that this Person came to discover 1. something more glorious then Moses had done and 2. something that expresses more abundant love and kindness of God towards men which is nothing else but Eternall Life First I say something more glorious and resplendent or as the Apostle speaks 2 Cor. iv 6. the light of the knowledge of the glory of God which we behold in the face of Jesus Christ For the Mount to which Moses went up and where he and the people heard God speak to them was all covered with clouds and thick darkness Thus God himself told him beforehand he would appear xix Exod. 9. And so he did when the day prefixed for it came vers 16 18. Unto that thick darkness Moses drew near xx 21. And the people also stood underneath the mountain beholding it burn with fire into the midst of heaven with darkness clouds and thick darkness iv Deut. 11. xix Exod. 17. All which places the Reader may be pleased to consult together with xxiv Exod. 18. where we find that Moses went into the midst of this cloud and there was covered and quite obscured from their sight A very fit emblem of the obscurity of the knowledge which they then had of God and of his will and of the terrours of the Law which was a ministration of death as the Apostle speaks and so astonished them with the thunders and lightning which came out of the cloud that they fled and stood afar off xx Exod. 18. As on the other side God appearing now to our Saviour in a quite contrary manner on the top of another Mountain where there was no black cloud though it was in the night no smoak or sulphureous vapour much less a thick darkness hiding him from his Disciples sight nothing but a bright and lightsome cloud which overshadowed them and shewed them the glory wherein he shone it was a lively representation of the light which he the Light of the world came to give to them that sate in darkness and in the shadow of death and of the glory and bliss whereof he was the Minister unto which he invited mankind in words of grace and sweetness as he did his Disciples to stay here on the mountain by those chearfull beams wherewith the glory of the Lord surrounded them For this manner of appearing as I said Secondly plainly suggests some greater manifestation of the love and kindness the goodness and bounty of Heaven to mankind then had been made before in that way of revelation to Moses which was so much different from the sweetness and amiableness of this When Moses conversed with God upon mount Sinai he descended thither in Fire as the places before mentioned tell you And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire in the eyes of the children of Israel xxiv Exod. 17. v. Deut. 22 23. But when our Blessed Lord took his Apostles with him to a sight of the Divine Glory there was onely the appearance of a wonderfull bright and chearful light some mild rays from heaven which had nothing of terrour in them but ravished them with joy to find themselves in so glorious a Presence And therefore they were not left at the foot of this high mountain as Moses left the Israelites at the bottom of the other but he brought them up with him xvii Matth. 1. And they were not put into a fright as the Israelites were who removed their station at the sight of the fire on mount Sinai nor did they shriek as their Forefathers did there who cried out saying Why should we die for this great fire will consume us if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any more we shall die Speak thou with us and we will hear but let not God speak with us lest we die v. Deuter 25. xx Exod. 19. But they were ravished out of themselves with the glory of this sight which was so inviting to their eyes that they wisht for no other station but desired to remain perpetually fixed there They were so far from running away that they said Let us make here three Tabernacles as if they meant to pitch there the place of their abode and never take their eyes from so beautifull a Light It is observable also that in the dark Mountain where Moses was together with the fire and thunder and lightnings there was the noise of a Trumpet exceeding loud which made not onely all the people tremble but the whole mount quaked greatly xix Exod. 16 18. And God spake likewise to the people with a great voice v. Deut. 22. wherewith both they were so astonished as to wish never to hear it more and Moses himself also so terrible was the sight together with the noise said I exceedingly fear and quake xii Heb. 21. Whereas on the Mountain where our Lord was transfigured there was not one such frightfull flash nor the least dreadfull sound nothing but his own glistering Body the splendour of Moses and Elias the brightness of a heavenly cloud and this one sweet voice which proclaimed nothing but love and grace in their ears This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear him St. Matthew indeed tells us that when the Disciples heard they fell on their faces and were sore afraid xvii 6. But this doth not signify that they were seised with any horrour at the dreadfulness of the sound but onely amazed at the suddenness of the voice and the marvellous splendour of the Light And therefore the other Evangelists do not mention any such terrour after the voice which being accompanied with a glory they had never beheld might well amaze them but did not make them tremble The very
we may be in danger of for Piety's sake Now looking a little farther into this Holy Writer who hath preserved the unquestionable Records concerning these matters I find there is as great a certainty of this Eternal Life by Jesus Christ as there is of his being the Son of God and that the very same Witnesses who so fully declare the one give no less strong Evidence for the proof of the other For THIS says He 1 John v. 11. IS THE RECORD or WITNESSE THAT GOD HATH GIVEN TO VS ETERNAL LIFE AND THIS LIFE IS IN HIS SON Which words being a continuation of the foregoing Discourse carry this sense in them There is great reason you should receive the Witness of God viz. of the Father Word and Holy Ghost and of the Water Bloud and Spirit not onely because it is greater then the Witness of men which you cannot justly reject v. 9. and because if you do reject it you make God a Liar which who can have the heart to do v. 10. but also because the thing which is testified to us by these Witnesses when they say that Jesus is the Son of God is of all other the most desirable viz. that God designs for us no less blessing then Eternal Life which the Lord Jesus hath in his hands to keep for us and to bestow upon us The ensuing Discourse then will necessarily fall into these two Parts First to shew what this Eternal Life is and secondly to prove the Certainty of it from the mouth of all those Witnesses Of the first of which I must treat with the greater brevity because it is not the Design of the Apostle in this place to give us an account what the Eternal Life is which God hath promised but to shew that he hath given us an undoubted right to it and that it is in the power of that Great Lord whose Servants we are by Faith in him to dispose of it THE WITNESSES TO Christianity PART II. CHAP. I. Of ETERNAL LIFE in generall AND now I launch out when I go about to speak of Eternal Life into a wide Sea of which it is but little that our eye can descry or our thoughts fathom and less that I must confine my self unto in this present Discourse There is more contained in these two words ETERNALL LIFE then all the world can discover though we have so good a Compass as the Book of God whereby to steer our course and to guide and assist us in our Inquiry We may venture as far as ever our thoughts will carry us into this depth but we shall still see something beyond all that we can conceive and be enabled by our search to discern more fully that it hath no bottom no bounds nor limits as will appear if you do but attend to this general Description of it out of the Holy Writings In whose style it is most certain it signifieth a full and constant enjoyment of all the happiness that our Being is capable to receive I say Happiness because as DEATH in the Sacred language denotes all manner of Misery affliction and trouble so by LIFE it expresses all kind of Felicity pleasure and contentment And I say full and constant happiness because the word ETERNALL must needs adde something to the other and that is compleatness firmness and solidity As Death if it be not eternall leaves some room for thoughts of happiness so Life if it want that addition doth not exclude all vexation and sadness But then on the contrary both the one and the other if this be annexed are made perfect without any hope of happiness in that Death or any fear of misery in this Life To clear our passage I judge it necessary to spend a few words in making good this Notion of Life and Death by producing some places of Holy Writ where they are so used And first for DEATH the very first time we meet with it in God's Book it is used to express all the Misery that man drew upon himself by his Sin ii Gen. 17. In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die i. e. fall into a most calamitous estate as it is explained iii. Gen. 16 17 18 19. till worn out with labour sorrow and pain he returned to the dust out of which he was taken Thus when the Locusts came upon the land of Egypt and destroyed every green thing Pharaoh intreats Moses x. Exod. 17. to pray to the Lord that he would take away this Death onely Which shews that all the plagues and disasters which fell upon that land went under this general name of DEATH though now it be restrained to the last and greatest of all punishments The like you reade in the second Book of the Kings iv 40. where the sons of the Prophets as they were eating of their pottage cry out Oman of God there is DEATH in the pot something that is very distastfull to the palate and perhaps hurtfull and poisonous to the body which made them they could not eat it In the New Testament also penned by men of the same country we find the very same language St. Paul saying that he was in Deaths often 2 Cor. xi 23. and that he died daily 1 Cor. xv 31. and wishing to be delivered from the body of this Death vii Rom. 24. i. e. of such misery that it made him sigh and groan sorely under the burthen of it And to name no more the Shadow of Death in these Books signifies nothing else but an horrible dangerous place or a dismall forlorn condition into which any miserable person is faln This being the notion then of the word DEATH in the speech of the Hebrews such must be the signification of the word LIFE which is opposite to it whereby they express all Felicity and comfortable enjoyments Thus when David says his enemies were lively or living as it is in the Hebrew text xxxviii Psal 19. he means they were in a flourishing prosperous condition abounding with all worldly goods while he was abandoned to contempt poverty and continual danger And when he says their heart shall live that seek God lxix Psal 32. his meaning is they shall enjoy true peace and contentment So when the people say 2 King xi 12. Let the King live which we render God save the King they wish him a prosperous and happy reign And when David acknowledges God to be the fountain of life xxxvi Psal 9. it is as much as to say an ever-running spring of all felicity from whom flows as the foregoing words are a river of pleasures Hence they are bid to keep to God's Commandments as their life xxxii Deut. 47. And this is said to be the excellency of knowledge that wisedom giveth LIFE to them that have it vii Eccles. 12. because by observing those wise precepts they were put into a most happy condition which could not be had by any other means but would certainly be lost by turning from those holy paths This is a
long ago Whether the Scripture be glorifie thy Son or glorifie thy Name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is all one in exact contemplation of things Now if the truth of these words be throughly examined how he had glorified him and how he would glorifie him again we shall meet in both with a plain testimony that Eternall Life is in his Son to bestow on us Let us consider them briefly apart I. As for the former I find that God had already glorified him before he spake these words three ways 1. By his Transfiguration of which I now discoursed for then St. Luke saith ix 32. they saw his glory And that by this Glory which they saw the Father testified he should be made glorious in the heavens and able to make us so I refer you to what I have said already on this Argument 2. And I need not use many words to shew that he had also glorified him very frequently by the many wonderfull works which he had wrought for in them it is likewise expresly said ii Joh. 11. he manifested forth his Glory and the multitude were excited by them to magnifie him with Hosanna's and to cry out Glory in the highest xix Luk. 37 38. By these also he shewed the power wherewith he was indued to doe any thing that he had promised and they moved his Disciples hearts as you reade in the place now mentioned ii Joh. 11. to believe on him 3. But there was a third glorification of him to which I believe these words have a more speciall reference because it was very famous and but newly passed Which was his raising Lazarus from the dead By this Jesus said expresly that glory should redound to God the Father and that He the Son of God should also be glorified thereby xi Joh. 4. For this very end he there teaches his Disciples Lazarus fell sick and he therefore delayed to go and recover him though his great friend that there might be a fit opportunity by the miraculous resurrection of so noted a person as Lazarus was it appears by the coming of such numbers to comfort his sisters vers 19. and in a place so nigh to Jerusalem vers 18. where the greatest opposition was made against him to doe honour to Jesus and to make it known that he assumed not more glory to himself then God the Father gave him This was a very great testimony from God that indeed LIFE was in him and that he did not vainly call himself vers 25. the resurrection and the life because he now with his almighty word restored one to life who had been so long dead that there was no possibility of his reviving but by the very LIFE it self Hereby he declared that as the Father hath Life in himself so he hath given the Son to have Life in himself v. Joh. 26. What he had said before in his preaching he now justified by his works according as he himself foretold he would when he said Verily verily the hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God ver 25. The hour which was then coming yea was just at hand seems to be this time when he raised Lazarus up out of his grave declaring thereby both the truth of what he had said v. Joh. 26. that he had life in himself and likewise that there would be another hour as it presently there follows ver 28 29. wherein all men whatsoever shall rise out of their graves at his voice and they that have done good shall come forth unto the resurrection of life as they that have done evill unto the resurrection of damnation They might well believe it because he said it who proved himself to be the Truth by such works as none could doe but he that was the Life II. But this is not all that we are to consider in this Testimony of the Father who doth not onely say that he had glorified him but that he would glorifie him again which was done also at three severall times 1. At his Death when many of the graves of the Saints that slept were opened xxvii Matth. 52. For the very rocks rent and the earth did quake and the veil of the temple was torn in sunder from the top to the bottom and the Sun refused to give its light and such an amazement came upon the Centurion who was then upon the guard that he glorified God xxiii Luk. 47. by confessing that Jesus was a righteous man and no pretender to a title that did not belong to him but as other Evangelists express it the Son of God To these wonderfull things concurring at his death to glorifie him and doe him honour the voice from Heaven seems to have had some respect because of what follows ver 31 32 33. Now shall the prince of this world be cast out And I if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men unto me This he said signifying what death he should die For even now when he seemed most weak he began to tread the Devill under his feet Now he began to draw not onely the Jews to him but other men the Romans also one of whose Captains in the midst of his reproach confessed him to be the Son of God The very opening of the graves served to adorn the triumph he was about to make over the powers of darkness being a sign that he had now despoiled him who hath the power of death which is the Devill and that he had Life in himself and will give it us especially now that he hath finished his triumph and is glorified at God's right hand Of which the rending of the veil also was no obscure token shewing that we have liberty as the Apostle speaks x. Heb. 19. to enter into the Holiest by the bloud of Jesus It may seem indeed an uncouth form of speech to call his Crucifixion by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lifting up from the earth or exaltation but one may say and with great truth that Christ's death upon the Cross as S. Fragment L. viii in Joh. Cyrill of Alexandria speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was his promotion contrived for his fame and glory for he is glorified perpetually for this having procured many benefits to mankind by its means This is one part of the Record of the Father to this Truth when he said he would glorifie our Saviour Which you see was as much as to say He would make it appear even when he hung upon the Cross that he was able to open mens graves and unloose the chains of death and in due time raise them up to everlasting life For 2. God farther glorified him at his Resurrection which was attended with the resurrection of the dead bodies of those Saints whose graves were opened at his death xxvii Matth. 52 53. There were severall witnesses of this in Jerusalem to whom those persons deceased appeared as there were of his own resurrection which