with profitable Instructions and in so many respects of great importance to the good of our Souls as this is CHAP. VII That to make men Holy was the Design of Christ's Death Proved by several Texts of Scripture And how it is effectual thereunto discovered in six Particulars FOurthly the making of us Holy as it was the Business of our Saviour's whole Life so was it also the great End and Design of his Death And this are we assured of by abundance of Express Scriptures Some few of which we will here produce Romans 6. 6. 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 2 Corinthians 5. 15. He dyed for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him which died for them and rose again Galatians 1. 4. Who gave himself for our Sins that he might deliver us from this present evil world viz. From its corrupt practices according to the Will of God and our Father Ephesians 5. 25 26 27. Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church and gave himself for it that he might sanctifie and cleanse it with the washing of Water by the word that he might present it unto himself a Glorious Church not having Spot or Wrinkle or any such thing but that it should be holy and without blemish Colossians 1. 21 22. And you that were sometimes alienated and enemies in your minds by wicked works hath he now reconciled in the Body of his flesh through death to present you holy and unblamable and unreprovable in his sight Titus 2. 14. Who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie to himself a peculiar people zealous of Good Works 1 Pet. 1. 18. For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with Corruptible things as Silver and Gold from your vain Conversation received by Tradition from your Fathers but with the precious blood of Christ as a Lamb without blemish and without Spot 1 Pet. 3. 18. For Christ also hath once suffered for Sins the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God c. That is saith Calvin upon the place that we might be so consecrated to God as to live and die to him 1 Pet. 2. 24. Who his own self bare our Sins in his Own body on the Tree that we being dead to sins should live to righteousness by whose Stripes ye were healed Now the Death of Christ is greatly effectual to this end of making us Holy these several ways First As it gave Testimony to the Truth of his Doctrine which as hath been shewn hath no other Design Christ took his Death upon it that that was true was willing to expose himself in the Defence thereof to a most ignominious and painful death Secondly As the shedding of his blood was a Federal right confirming the New Covenant wherein is promised in and through Him the Pardon of our Sins and Eternal happiness on Condition of our sincere Repentance Faith and new obedience So the Blood of Christ is called the Blood of the Covenant Heb. 10. 29. And the Blood of the Everlasting Covenant Heb. 13. 20. Thirdly As it is exemplary of the highest vertue 1 Pet. 2. 21. Christ also suffered for us leaving us an Example that we should follow his Steps who did no sin neither was guile found in his mouth who when he was reviled reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously The Greatest Humility and Self-denial the greatest Meekness Patience and Submission to the Divine Will the most wonderful Charity and Forgiveness of Enemies c. are exemplified in our Saviour's Death and so it must needs be very highly Effectual towards the promoting of these most Excellent Graces and the like in us and the expelling and utter extirpating out of us the Contrary Vices One would think it impossible that he should be of an Haughty Spirit and a proud mind that seriously Considers how the Onely-begotten Son of God humbled himself to the death even the shameful and ignominious death of the Cross That he should Covet great things in the world that frequently affects his mind with the thoughts of his Saviour's emptying himself and becoming poor that we through his proverty might be made rich and preferring the death of the Vilest of wretches before the life of the greatest and most Honourable Personages How can he be vain and frothy that considers his Saviour's horrid Agony what a man of Sorrows he was and how acquainted with Griefs How can he storm at the receiving of injuries and swell with indignation against those that offer him incivilities and rudely behave themselves towards him that fixeth his thoughts upon his Saviour's meek putting up the Vilest and most Contemptuous usages and considereth how gentle sedate and Lamb-like he was when Barbarous Villains Mocked Buffetted and Spit upon him Crowned him with Thorns put a Robe in a jear upon his Back and a Reed for a Scepter into his hand and at last acted the parts of the most inhumane Butchers towards him One would think it no uneasie matter to perswade our selves to forgive very heartily the Spitefullest most malicious enemies whilst we take notice that Christ shed even his pretious blood for those that carried in their breasts the greatest malignity against him and bare him the most deadly hatred that he suffered death for those which in the Cruellest manner they were able took away his life What temptation can be forcible enough to prevail upon us sinners to murmure and repine at the hand of God in the afflictions he inflicts upon us while we observe how much greater sufferings than ours are were with profoundest Submission to and likewise the heartiest approbation of the Divine Will endured by the not onely perfectly innocent but also the highly meriting and infinitely Well deserving Jesus Fourthly As the Death of Christ was likewise a Sacrifice for sin it was in an Eminent manner effectual to this great purpose In the death of Christ considered as an Expiatory and Propitiatory Sacrifice is the offence that God Almighty hath taken against sin and the hatred he bears to it as well as his Love to us sinners infinitely declared in that he would not forgive it to us without the intervention of no meaner an offering than the Blood of his onely-begotten Son Observe what the Apostle S. Paul saith to this Purpose Rom. 3. 25 26. Whom God hath set forth to be a Propitiation through Faith in his blood to declare his Righteousness for the remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God to declare I say at this time his Righteousness that he might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Iesus The Plain sense of which words as I conceive is this That God might at one and the same time demonstrate how holy he
the Father Phil. 2. 9 10 11. Now by vertue of the Authority he is by this means invested and dignified with and particularly as he is King of his Church hath he sent the Holy Ghost to Sanctifie us to excite us to all holy actions and to assist us in the performance of them Sixthly The Death of Christ doth also apparently promote this great Design as by his patient submitting to it he vindicated God's Right of Sovereignity over all his Creatures and the power he hath to require what he pleaseth and to dispose of them as seems good to him Whereas the First Adam by Contumacy Pride and Rebellion did put an high and unsufferable affront upon the Authority of his Maker and his wretched posterity followed his Example and have by that means done what lay in them to render his Right to their obedience questionable this Blessed Second Adam by acting directly Contrary viz. by Obedience Humility Subjecting himself to the Divine pleasure in the severest expressions and significations of it hath done publiquely and before the world an infinite honour to his Father And his absolute Right of Dominion over his whole Creation and the power he hath to prescribe to it what laws he judges sitting which was before so eclipsed by wicked sinners hath he by this means in the most signal manner manifested and made apparent And of what force this is to promote our Holiness and Universal obedience the dullest capacity may apprehend From what hath been said it appears to be a most plain and unquestionable Case that our Saviour in his Death considered according to each of the notions we have of it had an eye to the great work of making men Holy and that this was the main Design which he therein drove at And I now adde that where as it is frequently affirmed in the holy Scriptures that the End of Christ's death was also the Forgiveness of our sins the Reconciling of us to his Father we are not so to understand those places where this is expressed as if these Blessings were absolutely thereby procured for us or any otherwise than upon Condition of our effectuall believing and yielding obedience to his Gospel Nor is there any one thing scarcely which we are so frequently therein minded of as we are of this Christ died to put us into a Capacity of pardon the actual removing of our Guilt is not the necessary and immediate result of his Death but suspended till such time as the forementioned conditions by the help of his grace are performed by us But moreover it is in order to our being encouraged to sincere endeavours to forsake all sin and to be universally obedient for the time to come that our Saviour shed his blood for the Pardon of it This was intended in his death as it is subservient to that purpose the assurance of having all our sins forgiven upon our sincere Reformation being a necessary motive thereunto Therefore hath he delivered us from a necessity of Dying that we might live to God and therefore doth God offer to be in his Son Jesus reconciled to us that we may thereby be prevailed with to be reconciled to him Therefore was the Death of Christ designed to procure our Justification from all sins past that we might be by this means provoked to become new Creatures for the time to come Observe to this purpose what the Divine Author to the Hebrews saith Chap. 9. 13 14. If the blood of Bulls and Goats and the Ashes of an Heifer sprinkling the Unclean Sanctifieth to the Purifying of the flesh How much more shall the blood of Christ who through the Eternal Spirit ofsered himself without Spot to God purge your Consciences from dead works for what end it follows to Serve or in order to your Serving the Living God And thus much may suffice to be spoken concerning the Design of our Saviour's Death CHAP. VIII That it is onely the promoting of the Design of making men Holy that is aimed at by the Apostles insisting on the Doctrines of Christ's Resurrection Ascension and coming again to Judgement I Might in the next place proceed to shew that the Resurrection of our Saviour did carry on the same Design that his Precepts Promises and Threatnings Life and Death aimed at but who knows not that these would all have signified nothing to the promoting of this or any other end if he had always continued in the Grave and not risen again as he foretold he would If Christ be not risen saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 15. 13. then is our preaching vain and your faith is also vain So that whatsoever our Saviour intended in those particulars the perfecting and final accomplishment thereof must needs be eminently designed in his Resurrection The Apostle Peter tells his Country-men the Jews Acts 3. 21. that To them first God having raised up his Son Iesus sent him to bless them in turning every one of them from his iniquities But farthermore we find the Doctrine of Christ's Resurrection very much insisted on by S. Paul especially as a principle of the Spiritual and Divine life in us and proposed as that which we ought to have not onely a Speculative and Notional but also a Practical and Experimental acquaintance with And he often telleth us that it is our Duty to find that in our Souls which bears an analogy thereunto He saith Phil. 3. 10. That it was his ambition to know or feel within himself the Power of his Resurrection as well as the fellowship of his sufferings to have experience of his being no longer a dead but a living Jesus by his inlivening him and quickening his Soul with a new life And again he saith Rom. 6. 4. that Therefore we are buried with him by Baptism unto Death that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the Glory of the Father even so we also should walk in newness of life that is Christians being plunged into the Water in Baptism signifieth their undertaking and obliging themselves in a spiritual sence to die and be buried with Jesus Christ which death and burial consist in an utter renouncing and forsaking of all their sins that so answerably to his Resurrection they may live a Holy and a Godly life And it followeth vers 5. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death we shall be also in the likeness of his Resurrection that is If we are ingrafted into Christ by Mortification to Sin and so imitate his death we will no less have a Resemblance of his Resurrection by living to God or performing all acts of Piety and Christianity And then from vers 8. to 11. he thus proceeds Now if we be dead with Christ we believe that we shall or we will also live with him Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more death hath no more dominion over him For in that he died he died unto Sin once or for sin once for
all but in that he liveth he liveth unto God that is in heaven with God Likewise reckon ye your selves to be dead indeed unto sin but alive unto God through Iesus Christ our Lord that is after the Example of his Death and Resurrection account ye your selves obliged to die to Sin and to live to the Praise and Glory of God And the same use that the Apostle here makes of the Resurrection of our Saviour he doth also elsewhere of his Ascension and session at the Right hand of God Coloss. 3. 1. 2. If ye then be risen with Christ seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the Right Hand of God set your Affections on things above not on things on the earth for you are dead that is in profession having engaged your selves to renounce your past wicked life and your life is hid with Christ in God c. that is and the life you have by embracing the Christian Religion obliged your selves to lead is in Heaven where Christ is So that this sheweth the Informations the Gospel gives us of these things to be intended for Practical purposes and Incitements to Holiness And Christ's Resurrection with his following Advancement we are frequently minded of to teach us this most excellent Lesson that Obedience Patience and Humility are the way to Glory and therefore to encourage us to be followers of Him to tread in his holy steps and make him our Pattern This we have in the fore cited place Phil. 2. 5 6 7 c. And Hebr. 12. 1 2. We are exhorted to lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us and to run with patience the race that is set before us looking unto Iesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the Gross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the Throne of God And vers 3. To consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself that is especially how he is now rewarded for it lâ—…st we be weary and faint in our Minds And that the meaning of our being so often minded of our Saviour's coming again to Iudgement is to stir us up to all holiness of conversation who can be so ignorant as not to know For we are sufficiently told that we must be judged according to our Works especially such works as the Hypocrites of this age do most despise leave to be chiefly performed by their contemned Moralists as appears from Mâ—… 25. 34. to the end of the Chapter And Lastly that is very certain which is intimated in the 123 Page of the Free Discourse Namely That all the Doctrines of the Gospel as merely speculative as some at the first sight may seem to be have a tendency to the promoting of Real righteousness holiness and are revealed for that purpose But as I did not there so neither will I here proceed to shew it in all the several instances or in any more than I have now done and that for the reason that is there given But besides I conceive that what hath been discoursed already in this Section is abundantly sufficient to demonstrate what we have undertaken viz. That to make men truly vertuous and holy is the design the main and onely design of Christianity SECT II. Upon what accounts the Business of making men Holy came to be preferred by our Saviour before any other thing and to be principally designed by him CHAP. IX Two Accounts of this The first That this is to do the greatest good to men And that the Blessing of making men Holy is of all other the Greatest proved by several Arguments viz. First That it containeth in it a Deliverance from the worst of Evils and Sin shewed so to be I Proceed in the next place to shew how it comes to pass that of all other good things the making Man-kind truly vertuous and Holy is the grand and special Design of Christianity There are these two Accounts to be given of it First This is to do the Greatest Good to Men. Secondly This is to do the Best Service to God First The Making of us really Righteous and Holy is the Greatest Good that can possibly be done to us There is no blessing comparable to that of Purifying our Natures from Corrupt affections and induing them with Vertuous and Divine qualities The wiser sort of the Heathens themselves were abundantly satisfied of the truth of this And therefore the only design they professed to drive at in their Philosophy was the Purgation and Perfection of the Humane life Hierocles makes this to be the very Definition of it And by the purgation of mens lives he tells us is to be understood the Cleansing of them from the dregs and silth of unreasonable appetites and by their perfection the Recovery of that Excellency which reduceth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Divine likeness Now the Blessing of making men Holy is of all the greatest First Because it contains in it a Deliverance from the worst of Evils Those are utterly ignorant of the nature of Sin that imagine any evil greater than it or so great It was the Doctrine of the Stoicks that there is nothing evil but what is turpe vitiosum vile and vicious And Tully himself who professed not to be bound up to the Placita of any one Sect of Philosophers but to be free-minded and to give his Reason it s full scope and liberty takes upon him sometimes most stiffly and seemingly in very good earnest to maintain it dispute for it But as difficult as I find it to brook that Doctrine as they seem to understand it that more modest saying of his in the first book of his Tusculan Questions hath without doubt not a little of truth in it viz. That there is no evil comparable to that of Sin Hierocles a sober Philosopher and very free from the high-flown humour and Ranting genius of the Stoicks though he would allow that other things besides Sin may be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very grievous and difficult to be born yet he would admit nothing besides this to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 truly evil and he gives this reason for it viz. Because that certain Circumstances may make other things good that have the repute of evils but none can make this so He saith that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 well can never be joyned with any vice but so may it with every thing besides As it is proper to say concerning such or such a person 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he is well diseased he is well poor that is he is both these to good purpose behaving himself in his sickness and poverty as he ought to do but proceeds he it can never be said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. he doth injury well or he is rightly and as becomes him intemperate Now that wickedness is the greatest of evils is
is and how much he hateth sin on the one hand and how infinitely gracious he is in his willingness to forgive sinners on the other was Christ set forth by him to be a Propitiation through Faith in his blood There are many and they no Adversaries to the Doctrine of our Saviour's satisfaction that do not question but that God could have pardoned sin without any other Satisfaction than the Repentance of the Sinner and in the number of them were Calvin P. Martyr Musculus and Zanchy as might be fully shewn out of their several works but that this is not a place to do it in but he chose to have his Son die for it before he would admit any terms of Reconciliation that so he might perform the highest act of Grace in such a way as at the same time to shew also the greatest displeasure against Sin And therefore would he thus do that so he might the more effectually prevent wicked mens encouraging themselves by the consideration of his great mercy to persist in their wickedness Therefore was Christ set forth to be a propitiatory Sacrifice for Sin I will not say that his Father who is perfectly sui juris might be put by this means into a capacity of forgiving it but that it might be a Cogent motive and most prevailing Argument to Sinners to reform from it There is an excellent place to this purpose Rom. 18. 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 or by the means of sin condemned sin in the flesh that is what the Precepts of the Mosaical Law could not do in that they were weak by reason of the impetuosity of mens fleshly inclinations that the Son of God coming in the humane Nature and in all respects becoming like to us sin onely excepted did and by being a Sacrifice for Sin so the word Sin signifieth in diverse places as Leviticus 4. 29. Chap. 5. 6. 2 Cor. 5. 21. and as I suppose also Gen. 4. 7. Condemned Sin in his flesh he by this means shewing how hateful it is to God took the most effectual course to kill and destroy it And moreover the most dearly beloved Son of God undergoing such extreme sufferings for our Sins it is evidently thereby demonstrated what dismal vengeance those have reason to expect that shall continue impenitent and refuse to be reclaimed from them For saith he Luke 23. 31. Is they do these things in a green Tree what shall be done in the dry If God spared not his own most innocent holy and onely Son than whom nothing was or could be more dear to him but abandoned him to so shameful and horrid a death for our Sins how great and severe sufferings may we conclude he will inflict upon those Vile Creatures that dare still to live in Wilful disobedience to him And from the Death of Christ considered as a Sacrifice we farther learn what an esteem God hath for his holy Laws that he would not abate their Rigour nor remit the punishment due to the Transgressors of them without a Consideration of no meaner value than the most Pretious blood of his own Son And lastly in that Christ hath laid down his life at the appointment of God the Father for the purpose of making an Atonement of Sin this gives all men unspeakably greater assurance of the Pardon of True Penitents than the bare Consideration of the Divine Goodness could ever have done And so by this means have we the greatest encouragement that our hearts can wish to become new men and return to obedience and have all ground of Jealously and suspicion removed from us that we have been guilty of such heinous and so often repeated impieties as that it may not become the Holiness and Justice of God to remit them to us though they should be never so sincerely forsaken by us In the Death of our Saviour thus considered are contained as we have seen the strongest and most irresistible Arguments to a Holy Life and I farther adde such as are no less apt to work upon the principle of Ingenuity that is implanted in our natures than that of self-love For who that hath the least spark of it will not be powerfully inclined to hate all sin when he considereth that it was the Cause of such direful sufferings to so incomparably Excellent a person and infinitely obliging a Friend as Christ is Who but a Creature utterly destitute of that principle and therefore worse than a Brute Beast can find in his heart to take Pleasure in the Spear that let out the heart-blood of his most blessed Saviour and to carry himself towards that as a loving friend which was and still is the Lord of Glory's worst enemy Again hath Jesus Christ indured done so much for our sakes and are we able to give our selves leave to render all his sufferings and performances unsuccessful by continuing in disobedience Can we be willing that he should do and suffer so many things in vain and much more do our parts to make him do so Is this possible Nay hath he been Crucified for us by the wicked Iews and don 't we think that enough but must we our selves be Crucifying him afresh by our Sins and putting him again to an open shame by preferring our base lusts before him as the Iews did Baral bas Hath he expressed such astonishing love to us in dying for us and wo'nt we accept of it which we certainly refuse to do so long as we live in Sin Hath he purchased Eternal Salvation for us and such great and glorious things as Eye hath not seen nor ear heard and which have not entered into the heart of man to be conceived by him and can we perswade our selves to be so ungrateful to him as well as so wanting to our-selves as to refuse to receive these at his hands on those most reasonable terms on which he offers them Hath he bought us with such a price and can we refuse to be his Servants and rather chuse to be the slaves of Sathan the Devil's Drudges Where can we find so many strongly inciting Motives to hate and abandon all sin as are contained and very obvious in the Death and sufferings of our Saviour for it Fifthly The Death of our Saviour is in a special manner effectual to the making of us in all respects vertuous and holy as he hath thereby procured for us that Grace and Assistance that is necessary to enable us so to be In regard of his humbling himself as he did and becoming obedient to the death of the Cross hath God highly exalted him and given him a name that 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