ordered the matter it is made to serve a great many evil purposes and to overthrow the main Designs of Christianity And to make this appear I shall as briefly and plainly as the matter will bear represent to you those other opinions concerning our Union to Christ which are now in great vogue in the World and do very unjustly challenge to themselves the name of Gospel-Mysteries As first when we inquire what this Union betwixt Christ and Believers is they answer in general that it is a mystical Union through the Spirit and Faith This Mystical is a hard word and therefore to explain it they tell us that this mystical Union is an Union of Persons where yet Persons and Natures are distinct As there is an Union of three Persons in one Nature in the Trinity and of two Natures in one Person in Christ which is the Hypostatical Union so the mystical Union is an Union of Persons where both Persons and Natures are distinct and it is an Union of Persons but no Personal Union The Person of Christ is united to the person of the Believer and the person of the Believer is united to the Person of Christ as it must needs be where the Person of Christ is united to the person of the Believer which Union is made by Faith which receives the Person of Christ and therefore must unite to the Person of Christ I doubt that consequence is not good for men are not united to every thing they receive but yet what follows may help it out as it is in the Marriage-Union which joyns person to person This is not very clear yet and therefore as a fuller explication of it the same Author describes it thus This mystical Union is that supernatural spiritual intimous Oneness and Conjunction which is betwixt the Person of Christ and the person of Believers through the bonds of the Spirit and Faith upon which there follows mutual and reciprocal Communion with each other This Oneness and Conjunction are hard words still and therefore to explain them you must observe that Christ and Saints are united how why in respect of that Oneness and Conjunction that is between them This now is as plain as one could wish they are one by their Oneness Union is Union and Christ is Christ and Believers are Believers and Oneness is Oneness and thus Christ and Believers are united by their Oneness But what are the bonds of this Union though it had been convenient first to have understood the Union better why they are the Spirit and Faith the Spirit unites Christ to us and Faith unites us to Christ and who can deny this to be a very mystical Union But besides this mystical Union there is a Legal or Law-Union betwixt Christ and Believers as he is their surety and a moral Union the foundation of which is Love of which more in its proper place and thus the Person of Christ and the person of Believers are united mystically legally morally The design of all these distinctions is to prove the Union of Persons betwixt Christ and Believers and because I find this Author hath bewildred himself I will endeavour to help him out for it is a very plain case if Christ and believers are united their Persons must be united too for the Person of Christ is Christ himself and the Persons of believers are the believers themselves and I cannot understand how they can be united without their Persons that is without themselves but then they are united by mutual relations as the Persons of a Prince and his Subjects of a Husband and his Wife are united or by mutual affections or common Interest not by a natural adhesion of Persons but because I find it doth not satisfie these men that Christ and believers are united unless their Persons be united too it makes me suspect that there is a greater Mystery in this Union of Persons than every one apprehends and therefore Secondly Let us inquire what they mean by the Person of Christ to which believers must be united And here they have out-done all the metaphysical subtilties of Suarez and have found out a Person for Christ distinct from his Godhead and Manhood for there can be no other sense made of what Dr. Owen tells us That by the Graces of his Person he doth not mean the glorious excellencies of his Deity considered in it self abstracting from the office which for us as God and Man he undertook nor the outward appearance of his humane nature neither when he converst here on Earth nor yet as now exalted in glory But the graces of the Person of Christ as he is vested with the office of Mediation His spiritual eminency comeliness beauty as appointed and anointed by the Father unto that great work of bringing home all his Elect into his bosom Now unless the Person of Christ as Mediator be distinct from his Person as God Man all this is idle talk for what Personal Graces are there in Christ as Mediator which do not belong to him either as God or Man there are some things indeed which our Saviour did and suffer'd which he was not obliged to either as God or Man but as Mediator but surely he will not call the peculiar duties and actions of an office Personal Graces His Personal Graces fitted him for the discharge of his Mediatory office but whatever Personal Graces are in Christ belong to his Person still are seated either in his Divine or Humane Nature and he hath no Personal Graces as Mediator which he hath not either as God or Man And the Doctor himself when he accommodates the Description the Spouse gives of her Beloved to Christ tells us That he is white in the glory of his Deity and ruddy in the preciousness of his humanity because white is the complexion of glory and ruddy is very applicable to his humanity because man was called Adam from the red Earth whereof he was made which are excellent proofs but however white and ruddy belong to his divine and humane nature and that without any regard to his Mediatory office for he had been white in the glory of his Deity and ruddy with the red Earth of his humanity whether he had been consider'd as Mediator or not And in his first digression concerning the excellency of Christ Iesus to invite us to Communion with him in a Conjugal relation he tells us that Christ is exceeding excellent and desireable in his Deity and the glory thereof He is desireable and worthy our acceptation as consider'd in his Humanity in his freedom from sin and fulness of Grace c. Now though this look very like a contradiction to what he said before that by the graces of his Person he meant neither the excellencies of his divine nor humane nature yet he hath a salvo which will deliver him both from contradiction and from sense that he doth not consider these excellencies of his Deity or Humanity as
IMPRIMATUR May 30. 1673. Sam. Parker A DISCOURSE Concerning the KNOWLEDGE OF JESUS CHRIST AND Our Union and Communion with him c. By William Sherlock Rector of S t George Buttolph lane London LONDON Printed by I. M. for Walter Kettilby at the Bishops-Head in St Paul's Church-Yard MDCLXXIV THE PREFACE Christian Reader I Am conscious to my self of so honest a design in writing this Discourse that I am very very well armed against those various censures which are the usual reward of such Attempts for there is no such Sanctuary against the rudest clamours and the most unjust reproaches as a good Conscience I was heartily grieved to see so many well-disposed Persons abused with words and phrases which either signifie nothing or have a very ambiguous and doubtful or a very bad sense when I have observed that great zeal which some men have for the Worship of God I have often thought what great Instruments they might be of Gods glory were their zeal directed and governed with Knowledge and Iudgment and when I have observed how innocently and vertuously some of those men live who have espoused such Principles as naturally tend to make them bad I have thought what excellent Persons they might prove did they rightly understand so excellent a Religion as is published to the World in the Gospel of Christ such thoughts as these at first engaged me in this Work to rectifie those mistakes which will either make men bad or hinder and retard their progress in true goodness which is so pious and charitable a design as may at least plead my excuse though it should appear to be a mistaken zeal In the management of this Discourse I have carefully avoided all personal reflexions have not medled with the lives and actions of men which I am so charitable as to hope may be more orthodox than their judgments I have represented their opinions in their own words and am not conscious to my self that I have put any other sense upon their words than they intended and I cannot see what reason any man hath to take it ill that I repeat that which he himself thought fit to publish where they pretend to argue gravely I have examined their Arguments with all possible gravity and solemnity where they plainly toy and trifle I have so far complied with their humour as to smile sometimes though as modestly as any man can desire I have taken care not only to unteach men what was amiss but to explain and consirm the true notions of Religion lest any man should suspect that under a pretence of rectifying mistakes I designed to expose all Religion what men will account severe I cannot tell because the gentlest Arguments will appear severe to any man who is pinch't by them but I have given no hard words and have sometimes called things by softer names than they deserve on purpose to avoid the imputation of severity which is now the common artifice to teach men to despise and reproach what they cannot answer and if after all this I cannot escape without some hard names and hard censures I must be contented with my portion and indeed no man ought to expect better usage who considers that Mr. Baxter himself who hath deserved so well for his pious labours could not escape when he touch't upon their Darling Notions And now Christian Reader I shall beg no more of thee than to read this Discourse with an honest and unprejudiced mind and as I did not compose it without imploring the guidance and direction of God so I recommend it to thee with my hearty prayers that it may prove as useful as my intentions were honest and charitable Farewel THE CONTENTS THE Introduction concerning the various significations of the Name Christ in Scripture that it originally is the name of an Office but is used also to signifie the Person invested with this Office and the Gospel of Christ and the Church of Christ. Pag. 1. Of what use the consideration of Christs Person is in the Christian Religion 14 As first the greatness of his Person is a plain demonstration of Gods love to Mankind in that he gave his own Son for us 15 2. It gives great Reverence and Authority to his Gospel 17 3. It gives great Authority to his Example 18 4. This assures us of the infinite value of his Sacrifice and of the power of his Intercession 19 5. The Person of Christ is of no other consideration in the Christian Religion than as it hath an influence upon the great Ends of his Undertaking 21 Of the knowledge of Christ and the various ways whereby God hath manifested himself to the World 25 Dr. Owen's Notion of an acquaintance with Christs Person considered 38 How the Nature and Attributes of God may be learn't from an acquaintance with the Person of Christ. 42. And how we learn the knowledge of our selves with respect to sin 49. And to Righteousness 53. And our wisdom to walk with God 55 A new Scheme of Religion deduced from this acquaintance with Christs Person 57 How unsafe it is to found Religion on a pretended acquaintance with Christs Person which at most amounts to no more than uncertain conjectures or ambiguous and doubtful Reasonings 76 This way will serve other men as well as themselves and another Scheme of Religion from an acquaintance with Christ. 80 Of expounding Scripture by the sound of words 102 And by the Analogie of Faith 118 What is meant by our Union to Christ. 142 Those Metaphors which describe the Union betwixt Christ and Christians do primarily refer to the Christian Church 142 The Union of particular Christians to Christ is by means of their Union to the Christian Church 143 In what sense Christ calls himself a Vine 145 The Union betwixt Christ and the Christian Church is not natural but political 156 In what sense Christ is called a Shepherd Head and Husband 157. The reason of these Metaphors 159 This political Union is either only external and visible or true and real and what this external Union is 168 Wherein the real Union consists and concerning the subjection of our Souls and Spirits to Christ. 171 We are united to Christ by a participation of his Nature 172. And by a mutual and reciprocal Love 174 In what sense the Christian Church is called Gods Temple 175 This Union to Christ represented in the Sacraments of the New Testament 181 Fellowship and Communion with God and Christ in the Scripture-phrase signifie this political Union 186 The Lords Supper the only Act whereby our fellowship with God in this World is expressed 192 Of our Union to the Person of Christ 196 What is meant by the Person of Christ. 200 The Personal Excellencies of Christ considered 206 What is meant by the Fulness of Christ. 216 In what sense Christ is called our Life 228 Concerning the Personal Righteousness of Christ. 234 What is meant by the Lord our Righteousness 235 What is meant by the
abstracted from his office of Mediator though he might if he pleased for he considers those excellencies which are not peculiar to the office of Mediation but which would have belong'd to him as God and Man whether he had been Mediator or not but what becomes of his distinction of the Graces of Christs Person as Mediator from the Graces of his Person as God and Man when there are no Personal Graces in Christ but what belong to his Deity or Humanity and then you can find no other Person to be the subject of these Personal excellencies unless his office of Mediation must go for a distinct Person which is a new kind of heresie But whatever becomes of the sense of the distinction there is a very deep fetch in it the observing of which will discover the whole Mystery of the Person of Christ and our Union to him for these men consider that Christ saves us as he is our Mediator and not meerly consider'd as God or Man and they imagine that we receive Grace and Salvation from Christs Person just as we do water out of a Conduit or a gift and largess from a Prince that it flows to us from our Union to his Person And therefore they dress up the Person of the Mediator with all those personal graces and excellencies which may make him a fit Saviour that those who are thus united to his Person of which more in the next Section need not fear missing of Salvation Hence they ransack all the boundless perfections of the Deity and whatever they can find or fancy which speaks any comfort to Sinners this is presently a Personal Grace of the Mediator they consider all the glorious effects of his Mediation and whatever great things are spoken of his Gospel or Religion or Intercession for us these serve as Personal Graces too that all our hopes may be built not on the Gospel Covenant but on the Person of Christ so that the dispute now lies between the Person of Christ and his Gospel which must be the foundation of our hope which is the way to life and happiness To make this appear I shall consider that account which Dr. Owen gives us of the Personal graces and excellencies of Christ which in general consist in three things First His fitness to save from the grace of Union and the proper and necessary effects thereof Secondly His fulness to save from the Grace of Communion or the free consequences of the Grace of Union and Thirdly His excellency to endear from his compleat sutableness to all the wants of the Souls of men First That he is fit to be a Saviour from the Grace of Union and if you would understand what this strange Grace of Union is it is the uniting the nature of God and Man in one Person which makes him fit to be a Saviour to the uttermost He lays his hands upon God by partaking of his nature Zachar. 13. 7. and he lays his hands on us by partaking of our nature Hebr. 2. 14. 16. and so becomes a days-man or Umpire between both now though this be a great truth that the Union of the Divine and Humane Nature in Christ did excellently qualifie him for the Office of a Mediator yet this is the unhappiest man in expressing and proving it that I have met with for what an untoward representation is this of Christs Mediation that he came to make peace by laying his hands on God and men as if he came to part a Fray or Scuffle and he might as well have named Gen. 1. 1. or Matth. 1. 1. or any other place of Scripture for the proof it as those he mentions but to let that pass in his Chap. 3. he discourses this more at large and thither I shall follow him Where he tells us how glorious Christ is in his Deity and how desirable in his Humanity and what are the glorious effects of the Union of the Divine and Humane Nature As for the first how excellent and desirable Christ is in his Deity From the Deity of Christ he observes the endless bottomless boundless grace and compassion that is in him It is not the grace of a Creature no not of the humane Nature it self that can serve our turn if it could be conceived as separate from the Deity surely so many thirsty guilty Souls as every day drink deep and large draughts of grace and mercy from him would if I may so speak sink him to the very bottom nay it could afford no supply at all but only in a moral way and that is a very pitiful way indeed But when the Conduit of his Humanity is inseparably united to the infinite inexhaustible Fountain of the Deity who can look into the depths thereof If now there be grace enough for sinners in an alsufficient God it is in Christ On this ground it is That if all the World should if I may so say set themselves to drink free grace and mercy and pardon drawing waters continually from the Wells of Salvation if they should set themselves to draw from one single promise an Angel standing by and crying Drink O my Friends yea drink abundantly take as much grace and pardon as shall be abundantly sufficient for the World of sin which is in every one of you they would not be able to sink the grace of the promise of the Person of Christ you mean one hairs breadth The infiniteness of Grace with respect to its Spring or Fountain the Deity of Christ will answer all objections What is our finite guilt before it a World of sin is something though it hear no proportion indeed to infinite Grace shew me the Sinner that can spread his iniquity to the dimensions if I may so say no man ever had more need nor made better use of so says of this grace here is mercy enough for the greatest the oldest the stubbornest transgressor c. enough in all reason this what a comfort is it to sinners to have such a God for their Saviour whose Grace is boundless and bottomless and exceeds the largest dimensions of their sins though there be a World of sin in them But what now if the Divine Nature it self have not such an endless boundless bottomless grace and compassion as the Dr. now talks of For at other times when it serves his turn better we can hear nothing from him but the naturalness of Gods vindictive Iustice. Though God be rich in mercy he never told us yet that his mercy was so boundless and bottomless he hath given a great many demonstrations of the severity of his anger against sinners who could not be much worse than the greatest the oldest and stubbornest transgressors But supposing the Divine Nature were such a bottomless Fountain of Grace how comes this to be a Personal Grace of the Mediator For a Mediator as Mediator ought not to be considered as the Fountain but as the Minister of Grace God the Father certainly ought to come
unless we become one person with him and therefore though the Doctor be so careful to tell us that our Union to Christ is an Union of Persons but no Personal Union that we are not transformed into the Essence and Being of Christ so as to be Christed with Christ yet indeed there is no other way to make the Personal Righteousness of Christ our personal righteousness which is the righteousness required of us but by a Personal Union to Christ by being Christed with Christ as some speak how boldly soever yet very agreeably to these Principles But Thirdly Let us consider what truth there is in what he asserts That in the Law the debtor and the surety are but one person the Law looks upon them but as one and therefore both are equally liable to the debt and if the one pay it it is as much in the eye of the Law as if the other had paid it which he makes the Foundation of the Imputation of Christs Righteousness and Satisfaction to us because he being our surety we are but one person with him that is legally not personally one person as he warily distinguishes Now there needs no great skill in the Law to discover the weakness and Sophistry of this Discourse for no considering man can think it indifferent who pays the debt the surety or the debtor or that they are both equally obliged to it the debtor is the immediate debtor still and the surety only is obliged in case the other refuse or be unable to pay the debt and that is some little difference but then though the creditor be satisfied whether the debt be paid by the debtor or his surety and the Law will allow him no farther Action against either of them yet the Law doth not account it indifferent which of them pay it for though it permit the payment to be exacted from the surety in case the debtor refuse yet it will look back again and allow the surety an Action against the debtor for such a refusal which is an Argument that the Law doth not judge them one Person nor think it indifferent which of them pays the debt Thus it is in other cases if a man be surety for the appearance of another which is called giving Bail and is sometimes admitted in Criminal Causes the Law doth not judge them one Person for if the Prisoner escape the Bail or Surety shall be punisht according to the nature of the Fact and yet the Prisoner is not quitted by this means but liable either to the Arrest of the Surety or in Criminal Causes to the Sentence of the Law if ever he be re-taken Thus in Sureties for good Behaviour which sounds as if it were nearest of kin to the Imputation of Christs Righteousness as our surety though the surety be never so innocent and vertuous a person himself this will not serve him for whom he is surety but if he prove a Villain they shall be both punisht So that humane Laws are strangers to this Mystery of imputing the Righteousness of a Surety to a bad man Suretiship doth not so unite their persons that whatever one doth is always and to all purposes imputed to the other and if this will not hold good among mâ—n it is a very sorry foundation for this bargain and exchange betwixt Christ and Believers That he should take their sins upon himself and impute his Righteousness to them Let us now try whether the notion of a Mediator can do any better service than the notion of a Surety which is the second way of explaining this legal Union betwixt Christ and Believers which entitles them to all that Christ hath done or suffered and what this means we may learn from Dr. Owen who gives us this account of it That Christ fulfilled all Righteousness as he was Mediator and that whatever he did as Mediator he did it for them whose Mediator he was or in whose stead and for whose good he executed the office of a Mediator before God and hence it is that his compleat and perfect obedience to the Law is reckoned to us This is well said if it were as well proved and because this is a matter of great consequence I shall first examine those reasons the Dr. alledges to prove That Christ fulfilled all Righteousness as he was Mediator in their stead whose Mediator he was Secondly to avoid calumnies and objections I shall shew you briefly what influence the Righteoeusness of Christs life and the Sacrifice of his death have upon our acceptance with God As for the first we have some reason to require good proof of this since the notion of a Mediator includes no such thing A Mediator is one who interposes between two differing parties to accommodate the difference but it was never heard of yet that it was the office of a Mediator to perform the terms and conditions himself Moses was the Mediator of the first Covenant Gal. 3. 9. and his office was to receive the Law from God and to deliver it to the people and to command them to observe those Rites and Sacrifices and Expiations which God had ordained but he was not to fulfil the Righteousness of the Law for the whole Congregation thus Christ is now the Mediator of a better Covenant and his Office required that he should preach the Gospel which contains the terms of peace and reconciliation between God and men and since God would not enter into Covenant with sinners without the intervention of a Sacrifice he dyes too as a Sacrifice and Propitiation for the sins of the world and confirms and seals this new Covenant with his own blood and being risen again from the dead he executes this Office of Mediator with power and glory that is he intercedes for us according to the terms and conditions of this new Covenant to obtain the pardon of our sins and the assistance of the divine Grace to do the will of God and all those other blessings which are promised but the Office of Mediator doth not oblige him to fulfil the Righteousness of the Covenant for us this I am sure doth not so exactly fall in with the case and notion of Mediatorship among men But before we examine their proofs it is necessary to consider what it is they would prove that is what that Righteousness is which they say Christ as our Mediator fulfilled for us and Dr. Owen is very exact and curious in stating this matter and distinguishes between the several sorts of Righteousness in Christ that we may know what belongs to us and what is peculiar to himself First he tells us of an habitual Righteousness of Christ as Mediator in his humane Nature which was the absolute compleat exact conformity of the Soul of Christ to the mind will or law of God or his perfect habitual Inherent Righteousness now he tells us that this Righteousness was the necessary effect of the Grace of Union that is of the Union of the Divine and
God to damn him that he shall contentedly submit himself to God to be damned or saved as he pleases and now the Soul being thus empty and hollow is fit to receive Christ into it and being grown careless of its Salvation and indifferent whether it be saved or damned for it is impossible thus to submit to God without being indifferent in some measure which God shall chuse it is a fit object for mercy certainly it is a very hard thing to bring any man in his wits to this and I find by this Author that God is very hard put to it thus to humble the Soul for he is forc'd to irritate and stir up original corruption to stir the dunghill a very unfit office for a holy Being that so men finding themselves sensibly grow worse and worse every day may despair of growing better and leave off such vain attempts and set down humble under God nay the Lord loads and tires and wearies the Soul by its own endeavours till it can stir no more that is when the Soul labours with all its might to repent and reform the Spirit of God which should encourage and assist all such pious endeavours withdraws it self because it knows the Soul would rest therein without Christ now I confess I know not who suffers most by this the Sinner who is thus humbled and broken or God who thus humbles him for it must needs be as contrary to the holy and merciful Nature of God to use such methods of humiliation as it is to the proud heart of man to be thus humbled Thus you see that Humiliation hath nothing to do with repentance and reformation of our lives for one great end of humiliation is to cure men of such carnal conceits as to think to please God by repenting and reforming our sins and this is the next immediate disposition towards our receiving Christ and closing with him For now when the Soul is thus humbled it is time it should go to Christ though the truth is such Souls are so wounded and humbled now that they lye dead at Gods feet and are as unable to believe as they were to humble themselves and therefore now the Lord takes them up in his Arms that they may lean and rest upon the bosom of their beloved by Faith Now the form and essence of Faith this uniting Grace consists in this that it is the coming of the whole Soul out of it self to Christ Faith does nothing for life for that is the Law of Works it only receives him who hath done all for it it comes out of all it hath or doth unto Christ for life The Soul by sin is averted from God and turns his back upon God the turning and coming of the Soul not unto duties of Holiness for that is obedience properly but unto God in Christ again is properly and formally Faith So to come to Christ as to drink in of Christs fulness is believing in Christ. But then Faith is the coming of the whole Soul to Christ and that is when the eye of the Soul so sees Christ and the heart so embraceth and relyeth upon Christ as that it resteth in Christ as in its portion and all-sufficient good This is the Faith which unites us to Christ and this Faith you see hath nothing at all to do with obedience in uniting us to Christ but it perfects this Union between Christ and Believers while they are as ugly and deformed and vicious as may be very unfit persons methinks to become the Members of so holy an Head This is enough to convince any considering man how false this notion is of our Union to Christ according to which wicked men who live in sin may be united to Christ for the Scripture places the formal nature of our Union to Christ in a subjection to his Authority and Obedience to his Laws as I have already made it appear and therefore an holy life must not only follow our Union to Christ as an effect of it but must at least in order of Nature go before it because by this we are united to Christ. A visible profession of an holy life is necessary to our admission into the Christian Church which is the Body of Christ but though this makes us visible Members of Christs Body and give us a right to an external Communion yet we are not real and living Members of Christ till we sincerely obey him till our minds are transformed into his Image our Union to Christ is more or less perfect according to our attainments in true piety and vertue The first and lowest degree of our Union with Christ is a belief of his Gospel which in order of Nature must go before obedience to it but yet it includes a purpose and resolution of obeying it and in this sense we must be united to Christ before we can be holy because this belief of his Gospel is the great Principle of Obedience as our Saviour tells his Disciples Abide in me and I in you as the branch cannot bring forth fruit of it self except it abide in the Vine no more can ye except you abide in me Ioh. 15. 4. But then our Union is not perfected without actual obedience this makes us the true Disciples of Christ when we are fruitful in good works as he adds in Vers. 8. Herein is my Father glorified that you bring forth much fruit so shall you be my Disciples A belief of the Gospel of Christ and a purpose to live in obedience to it is all that can be expected from beginners but this doth not give us an actual title to all the promises of the Gospel unless we actually obey it but when in the strength of this Faith we conquer all the temptations of the World and the Flesh and improve all the opportunities of doing good this makes us the Disciples of Christ indeed and Heirs of Glory Christ receives bad men as soon as they believe his Gospel and resolve to be good but their reward is suspended upon the performance of these vows and this is no reproach to his Holiness but nothing can be a greater dishonour to our Saviour nor a greater contradiction to his Gospel than to affirm that wicked men while they continue such are actually united to Christ and thereby have an actual right to pardon and righteousness and eternal life St. Iohn I am sure understood not this Doctrine when he told us That God is light and in him is no darkness at all if we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness live in any sin we lye and do not the truth but if we walk in the light as God is in the light then have we fellowship one with another 1 Joh. 1. 5 6 7. This Doctrine doth not only take away the necessity of holiness in order to our Union with Christ but destroys the necessary obligations to holiness and obedience for the future and so thrusts holiness quite
And he was a Kingly Priest a Priest after the order of Melchizedec who was King of Salem the new Ierusalem which comes down from Heaven and Priest of the most high God Hebr. 7. Verse 1. when he offered himself a Sacrifice for sin he acted like a King No man took his life from him but he had power to lay it down and he had power to take it again in the 10th Chapter of St. Iohn's Gospel and 18. Verse Herein he differ'd from other Kings that he laid the Foundation of his Kingdom in his own blood purchas'd and redeem'd his Subjects by the Sacrifice of himself And that to which we commonly appropriate the name of Regal Power that authority he is invested with to Govern his Church to send his Spirit to forgive sins to dispense his Grace and supernatural assistances to answer Prayers to raise the dead and judge the World and bestow immortal life on all his sincere Disciples all this is the reward of his death and sufferings and is therefore called his intercession because like the intercession of the high Priest under the Law it is founded on his expiation and Sacrifice With his own blood he entred once into the holy place having obtained eternal redemption for us Hebrews 9. Verse 12. so that intercession signifies the Administration of his Mediatory Kingdom the Power of a Regal Priest to expiate and forgive sins This is a true account of the nature of Christs Kingdom and the method whereby it is erected He first conquers the minds of men by the power of his Word and Spirit and reduces them into subjection to God and then he pardons their sins and raiseth them into an immortal life by the expiation of his Sacrifice and that Power and Authority which is founded on it And this is the interpretation of the name Christ which signifies a Mediatory King immediately appointed by God to that Office and consecrated to it by a Divine and Supernatural Unction And thus the name Christ signifies in those places of Scripture where Iesus is said to be the Christ i. e. that Messias whom God promised to send Which are so many and so obvious that I need not name them Secondly Though Christ is originally the name of an Office yet it is used in Scripture to signifie the Person who is invested with this Office for the use of names being for distinction and the Office of a Mediator which is the first signification of the name Christ being appropriate to Him it might well serve for a proper name when once it was known who was the Christ. And therefore though before his designation to this Office was publickly owned he was only called Iesus the name given him by the Angel before he was born yet when by his resurrection from the dead He was declared with power to be the Son and the Christ of God Christ became as much his proper name as Iesus was before In the Gospels which contain the History of his Life and Death He is always called Iesus because all this time it was disputed whether he were the Christ or not but in the Epistles which are directed to the Christian Churches which were founded on this Faith that Iesus is the Christ he is as familiarly called Christ as Iesus and oftentimes by both Iesus Christ. For there can be no mistake in the Person by what name soever he be called whether it belong to his Office or Nature or circumstances of his Life and Fortune if there be but One to whom that name belongs Thirdly Christ signifies the Gospel and Religion of Christ as Moses signifies the Writings and Laws of Moses and the Prophets the Writings or Sermons of the Prophets in the 16. Ch. of St. Lukes Gospel 29. Verse They have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them and in the 31. Verse If they hear not Moses and the Prophets neither will they be perswaded though one rise from the dead And there is nothing more usual in common speech than to call any Laws or Religion or Philosophy by the name of the first Authors Thus in the 6. Chapter to the Galathians 15. Verse In Christ Iesus neither Circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision but a new Creature that is in the Gospel and Religion of Christ nothing is of any value to recommend us to the favour of God but a new Nature a holy and vertuous life The Law preferr'd Circumcision before Uncircumcision but the Gospel of Christ makes no such distinction but instead of those external signs requires the inward purity of heart Thus in the second Chapter of the Ep. to Coll. 8. Verse Beware lest men spoil you through Philosophy and vain deceit after the traditions of men after the Rudiments of the World and not after Christ. Where after Christ is opposed to the traditions of men and the Rudiments of the World and therefore must signifie not the Person but the Religion or Gospel of Christ i. e. have a care lest you be corrupted with the foolish opinions and superstitions of men which are inconsistent with the Christian Philosophy a plain contradiction to the Doctrine and Religion of Christ. And in the 6. Verse As you have therefore received Christ Iesus the Lord so walk in him i. e. obey the Doctrine of Christ as you have been taught it by us for so in the next Verse he calls it Being established in the Faith as you have been taught The like we may see in the 4. Chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians 20 21. Verses But you have not so learned Christ if so be you have heard him and been taught by him as the truth is in Iesus Now what can learning Christ signifie but learning the Gospel of Christ. And how could the Ephesians who never saw Christ in the flesh be said to hear him in any other sense than as they heard his Gospel preacht to them ver 8. and to be instructed in him as the truth is in Iesus for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies not as our Translators render it being taught by him but instructed in him must be expounded of his Religion in its genuine and primitive simplicity so as Christ taught it his Disciples without the mixture of such corrupt and impure Doctrines as the Gnostick Hereticks had taught under the name of Christianity These I take to be very convincing allegations of the use of the name Christ for his Doctrine and Religion Fourthly It is acknowledg'd by all that Christ sometimes signifies the Church of Christ which is his body the fullness of him that filleth all in all And thus we must understand those Phrases of being in Christ engrafted into Christ and united to Christ which signifie no more than to be a Christian One who belongs to that Society whereof Christ is the Head and Governour thus it is used in the 12. Chapter of the Ep. to the Romans 5. Verse We being many are One Body in Christ i. e. we are all
great authority to his example He came to be our Prophet and our guide to teach us by his Precepts and his life now we love to imitate great Persons and none so great as he who was the brightness of his Fathers Glory and the express image of his Person His example secures the honour and reputation of vertue and gives us an evident demonstration wherein the perfection of our nature consists for he lived up to the perfection of humane nature and the only way to be perfect is to live as he lived Nay the greatness of his Person makes all the expressions of his love and goodness the more wonderful That the Son of God should become man that when he was rich for our sakes he should become poor that the great Lord of the Creation should become a Minister and Servant that the Lord of life and glory should suffer and die These are such expressions of love and goodness as we can never fully imitate because we can never be so great as he was but yet they powerfully convince us how reasonable it is for us to stoop to the meanest offices of kindness since we can never stoop so low as the Son of God did when he came down from Heaven and took up his Lodging in the grave Fourthly This assures us of the infinite value of his Sacrifice and the power of his intercession He was a Priest of a higher order than that of Aaron and his Sacrifice of a greater value than the bloud of Bulls and Goats God cannot but be pleased when his own Son undertakes to be a ransom and to make atonement for Sinners which is so great a vindication of Gods Dominion and Soveraignty of the authority of his Laws and the Wisdom and Justice of his Providence that he may securely pardon humble and penitent Sinners without reproaching any of his Attributes And we can reasonably desire no greater security for the performance of this Gospel Covenant than that it was sealed with the bloud of the Son of God which is such a confirmation of God's Covenant and Promise as the World never had before Christ is the surety of a better Testament Hebr. 7. 22. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one who undertakes for the performance of it and the security he gives us depends on thè vertue of his Priesthood and Sacrifice and the power of his Intercession for so in Verse 21. the Apostle tells us that God had confirmed the Priesthood of Christ by Oath The Lord hath sworn and will not repent Thou art a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedec And whereas other Priests died and left their Priesthood to their Successors He continueth for ever and therefore hath an unchangeable Priesthood and is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them Verse 23 24 25. And who can desire a more powerful Mediator than the Son of God to whom God hath given such signal demonstrations of his favour and acceptance by a voice from Heaven and by the glory of his Miracles and his Resurrection from the Dead And that the vertue of Christs Sacrifice and Intercession depends very much on the greatness of his Person is plain from the Epistle to the Hebrews the design of which is to show how much the Priesthood and Sacrifice of Christ excels that of the Law and the Foundation of all is laid in the first Chapter where the Apostle discourses of his greatness and excellency that he was the brightness of his Fathers glory and the express Image of his Person the Heir of all things by whom he made the Worlds exalted above all Angels who hath an everlasting Throne and Scepter and shall continue when all other things moulder and vanish away But Fifthly The Person of Christ is of no other consideration in the Christian Religion than as it hath an influence upon the great ends of his undertaking i. e. we must expect no more from Christ upon account of his Personal excellencies and perfections than what he hath promised in his Gospel He hath told us there whatever he intends to do for us and hath charged us to expect no more from him Math. 7. 21. Not every one that saith unto me Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven but he that doth the will of my Father which is in Heaven That is you must not expect that I will be better to you than my word and receive you into the Kingdom of Heaven upon easier terms than I have promised I shall be moved with none of your flattering speeches but how good and kind soever you may fancy me unless you obey those Laws I publish in my Fathers name I declare before hand that I will disown you when I come to judgment For indeed should he absolve and justifie those men whom the Gospel condemns that is wilful and incorrigible Sinners this were to disanul that Covenant which he had sealed with his bloud Christ is the object of our Faith and Hope only as he is our Saviour and he is our Saviour in no other sense than as he is our Mediator and he mediates for us as our Priest that is in vertue of that Covenant which he hath sealed with his bloud and therefore we have no reason to expect any thing from the Person of Christ which is not contained in his Covenant much less which contradicts it for that would be in effect to renounce his Mediation and to trust to the goodness of his nature And let any man judg whether this be not to set up a new Religion which hath no Covenant and no Promise for whatever we can expect from Christ by vertue of a Promise is contained in the Gospel and if we expect any thing else from him upon his Personal account it is without a promise which at best reduces us to the same state in which the World was before God had made an express revelation of his will when all their hopes were founded on that natural perswasion they had of the divine Goodness that Faith which is the Foundation of Natural Religion that God is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him Hebr. 11. 6. thus these men trust in the Person of Christ without any Promise nay which makes the case much worse in contradiction to the terms of that Covenant which he sealed with his bloud they quit his Promise and his Covenant to rely and rowl upon his Person This is so very absurd at first sight that I know no man will be so senseless as to owne it in so many words nor do I charge any man with it but I say this is the natural interpretation of trusting in the Person of Christ in his blood and merits and satisfaction fulness and alsufficiency and of relying and rowling the Soul on Christ for Salvation and the like Phrases of a late date in which some men place the whole mystery
cometh unto the Father but by me if you had known me you should have known my Father also and henceforth you have known him and have seen him That is I alone declare the true way to life and happiness and no man can thoroughly understand the will of God but by learning of me and therefore whoever knows me i. e. whoever is acquainted with the Doctrine and Religion I preach knows my Father also that is is thoroughly instructed in God's mind and will as he proves in the following Verses So that to know God is to understand the will of God concerning the Salvation of Mankind and to know Christ is to understand that Declaration he hath made of Gods will to the World i. e. the Gospel which he Preached which is therefore called the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Iesus Christ. 2 Cor. 4. 6. That is that glorious manifestation God hath made of himself to the World by Christ for the face of Christ signifies all that whereby he made himself known as a man is known by his face that is his Laws and Religion and Miracles whereby it appeared that he was the Son of God the great Prophet and Saviour of the World by all this the glory of God was manifested in which the Apostle alludes to that shining glory which appeared on the face of Moses when he came down from the Mount which was but typical of that bright and glorious manifestation God would make of himself by Christ. God was seen in Christ he that hath seen me hath seen my Father that is in plain words the will of God was fully declared to the World by Christ upon which account too as well as with respect to his divine Nature he is called the brightness of his Fathers glory and the express image of his Person Hebr. 1. 1. those discoveries Christ hath made of God being a bright and glorious reflexion of the Nature and Attributes of God of his Eternal Wisdom and truth and holiness as true a representation of the divine nature and will as any Picture is of the person it represents It is plain that in this sense Christ is called the image of God 2 Cor. 4. 4. Lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ which is the image of God should shine unto them Where Christ's being the Image of God comes in very abruptly unless we understand it in this sense that he is the Image of God with respect to the glorious Revelations of the Gospel which contain a true and faithful account of God's Nature and Will The result of all is this that God is the last and highest object of Religious and saving Knowledge i. e. that the only Knowledge necessary to the purposes of Religion is such a knowledge of God's Nature and Will as is sufficient to direct our actions and encourage our obedience and whereas God was formerly known by the light of nature and the works of Creation and Providence and those partial and occasional revelations of his will which he made to the World now the only true medium of knowing God is the Knowledge of Christ who came into the World to declare God to us He knows God best who is best acquainted with those Revelations Christ hath made of God's will i. e. who understands the Gospel in its full extent and latitude This is the meaning of that expression in Iohn 17. 3. This is life Eternal that they might know thee the only true God and Iesus Christ whom thou hast sent i. e. the only way to Eternal Life is to know the nature and will of God and the only certain way of attaining to the knowledg of God is by knowing Christ whom God sent into the World to publish the Everlasting Gospel who hath made more perfect revelations of Gods will than ever the World had before and who alone hath brought life and immortality to light so that to know Christ is not meerly to know his Person which we can have no other knowledge of than what he hath been pleased to reveal to us but to be acquainted with the whole Doctrine of the Gospel in its native simplicity as he published it to the World which I observed before The Apostle calls this learning Christ and being instructed in him as the truth is in Iesus For when we speak of the Knowledge of Christ we must consider him as our Prophet and so to know Christ signifies to know his Gospel and to preach Christ is to preach his Gospel to expound all those rules of life and Articles of Faith which are contained in it whether they are concerning the nature of God or a future State or his own Nature and Office and Mediation Thus Philip preached Christ to the Samaritanes Acts 8. 5. which in Verse 12. is called preaching the things concerning the Kingdom of God and the name of Iesus Christ. That is the whole Doctrine of the Gospel This should make all considering men ashamed of those unreasonable and groundless clamours that Christ is not preached unless he be named in every sentence whether the argument require it or not as if preaching Christ were to be understood in a literal sense of preaching nothing but the name of Christ those preach Christ most who are careful to confirm men in the belief of the Gospel and of that great promise of immortal life who expound his Laws and the true nature and design of his Mediation for every part of the Gospel is part of the Knowledge of Christ and his Laws as principal a part as any because the design of the whole Gospel is to make us obedient to these Eternal Rules of Righteousness whereby we are transformed into the nature and Image of God and qualified for the happiness of Heaven There is indeed a larger notion of the Knowledge of God and Christ which includes the vertue and efficacy of this knowledge for the design of all Religious knowledge being the Government of our lives and actions how true soever our speculations are the Scripture brands all those as ignorant of God who do not love and reverence and obey him and though we be acquainted with the whole Doctrine of the Gospel unless we heartily believe it and obey all those Revelations Christ hath made we know him not Iohn 1. 2 3. Hereby we know that we know him if we keep his Commandments And Verse 4. He that saith I know him and keepeth not his Commandments is a lyar and the truth is not in him And 1 Iohn 3. 6. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not whosoever sinneth hath not seen him neither known him Not but that bad men may have as true a speculative knowledge of the nature and design of the Gospel as good men have but the meaning is that this is a knowledge which serves no end which wants life and sense and makes men no better than if they were perfectly ignorant and therefore is of no other
account with God than ignorance unless it be to aggravate their sins and their condemnation SECT II. Of acquaintance with the Person of Christ. AFter this plain account wherein the Knowledge of Christ consists the sum of which is that to know Christ is to understand his Gospel which contains all those revelations he made of God's will it will be necessary to examine another notion of the Knowledge of Christ very distinct from this which contains a greater secret than at first one would imagine and that is an acquaintance with the Person of Christ which if we will believe some men is the only fountain of saving knowledge I shall not envy the Author the glory of this discovery and therefore shall honestly confess where I had it viz. in a Book Entitled Communion with God the Father Son and Holy Ghost each Person distinctly Written by Iohn Owen D. D. And that I may not do this Author wrong I must tell you what he means by acquaintance with Christ's Person an account of which we have in digression 2. pag. 87. of the excellency of Christ Iesus Where he tells us that Christ is not only the Wisdom of God but made wisdom to us not only by teaching us wisdom that is by the Doctrines he preached and those revelations he hath made of God's will as he is the great Prophet of the Church but also because by the knowing of him we become acquainted with the wisdom of God which is our wisdom To which purpose he applies that Text which speaks of the Doctrines and Revelations of Christ to his Person Coll. 2. 3. For in him dwell all the Treasures of Wisdom and Knowledge So that our acquaintance with Christ's Person in this man's Divinity signifies such a knowledge of what Christ is hath done and suffered for us from whence we may learn those greater deeper and more saving Mysteries of the Gospel which Christ hath not expresly revealed to us for so he adds soon after that these properties of God his pardoning mercy c. Christ hath revealed in his Doctrine in that revelation he hath made of God and his will but the life of this knowledge lies in an acquaintance with his Person wherein the express image and beams of this glory of his Father doth shine forth that is that these things are clearly eminently and savingly only to be discovered in Iesus Christ as he explains himself So that it seems the Gospel of Christ makes a very imperfect and obscure discovery of the nature and Attributes and will of God and the methods of our recovery we may thoroughly understand whatever is revealed in the Gospel and yet not have a clear and saving knowledge of these things unless we gain a more intimate acquaintance with the Person of Christ. This indeed advances the Person of Christ very much but is no great commendation of his Gospel and prophetick office It sets up a new rule of Faith above the Gospel viz. an acquaintance with Christ's Person in whom dwell all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge But that you may better understand the whole mystery of this Acquaintance with the Person of Christ I shall first show you what additions these men make to the Gospel of Christ from an acquaintance with his Person and secondly show you what an unsafe way of arguing this is and how prejudicial to the Christian Religion First to show you what additions these men make to the Gospel of Christ from an acquaintance with his Person And I confess I am very much beholden to this Author for acknowledging whence they fetch all their Orthodoxy and Gospel Mysteries for I had almost pored my eyes out with seeking for them in the Gospel and could never find them but I learn now that indeed they are not to be found there unless we be first acquainted with the Person of Christ. This is an argument well worth considering and if this discourse should prove long as I fear it will I doubt not but the usefulness of it will be a sufficient reward both to the Writer and Reader And since I owe this discovery to Dr. Iohn Owen I shall confine my self to his method who in the place above-mentioned tells us that the sum of all true wisdom and knowledge may be reduced to these three heads First The knowledge of God his nature and properties Secondly The knowledge of our selves with reference to the will of God concerning us Thirdly Skill to walk in Communion with God In these three is summed up all true wisdom and knowledge and not any of them is to any purpose to be obtained or is manifested but only in and by the Lord Christ. Where By is fallaciously added to include the Revelations Christ hath made whereas his first undertaking was to show how impossible it is to understand these things savingly and clearly notwithstanding all those Revelations God hath made of himself and his will by Moses and the Prophets and by Christ himself without an acquaintance with his Person But to let that pass I shall begin with the knowledge of God his nature and properties and I shall not particularly examine every thing he says but principally take notice of those peculiar discoveries of the nature of God which the World was ignorant of before and of which Revelation is wholly silent but are now clearly and savingly learnt from an Acquaintance with Christ's Person The light of nature and the works of Creation and Providence and those manifold Revelations God hath made of himself to the World especially that last and most perfect Revelation by Iesus Christ our Lord assure us that God is infinite in all perfections that he is so powerful that he can do whatever he pleases so wise that he knows how to order every thing for the best so good that he desires and designs the happiness of all his Creatures according to the capacity of their natures so holy that he hath a natural love for all good men and will not fail to reward them but hates all sin and wickedness and will as certainly punish all obstinate and incorrigible Sinners but yet that he is very patient and long-suffering towards the worst of men and uses various methods of kindness and severity to reclaim them and is as ready to pardon them when they return to their duty as a kind Father is to receive an humble and penitent Prodigal These properties of God are plainly revealed in the Scripture without any further acquaintance with the Person of Christ And had Christ never appeared in the World yet we had reason to believe that God is thus wise and good and holy and merciful because not only the works of Nature and Providence but the word of God assure us that he is so the Appearance of Christ did not first discover the nature of God to us but only gave us a greater expression of God's goodness than ever we had before confirms us in the belief of what we had
learnt before from nature and Revelation just as his Resurrection which is an ocular demonstration of another life confirms us in the belief of that blessed Immortality he had promised and yet we could not have learnt this neither from the Person of Christ had he not told us for what ends he came into the World as will appear more anon And is not this a confident man to tell us that the love of God to Sinners and his pardoning mercy could never have entred into the heart of man but by Christ when the experience of the whole World confutes him for whatever becomes of his new Theories both Jews and Heathens who understood nothing at all of what Christ was to do in order to our recovery did believe God to be gracious and merciful to Sinners and had reason to do so because God himself had assured the Jews that he was a gracious and merciful God pardoning iniquitiy transgressions and sins And those natural notions the Heathens had of God and all those discoveries God had made of himself in the works of Creation and Providence did assure them that God is very good and it is not possible to understand what goodness is without pardoning Grace But yet the truth is considering what these men mean by the love and pardoning Grace and Justice and Patience and Long-suffering of God I must acknowledge that these properties could never have been discovered but by a too familiar acquaintance with Christ's Person for Nature and Revelation say nothing of them As for Instance he tells us that in Christ that is in his death and sufferings for our sins God hath manifested the naturalness of this Righteousness i. e. vindictive justice in punishing sin unto him in that it was impossible that it should be diverted from Sinners without the interposing of a propitiation That is that God is so just and righteous that he cannot pardon sin without satisfaction to his justice now this indeed is such a notion of justice as is perfectly new which neither Scripture nor nature acquaints us with for all mankind have accounted it an Act of goodness without the least suspition of injustice in it to remit injuries and offences without exacting any punishment And that he is so far from being just that he is cruel and savage who will remit no offence till he hath satisfied his revenge That part of justice which consists in punishing offenders was always lookt on as an Instrument of Government and therefore the exacting or remitting punishment was referred to the wisdom of Governours who might spare or punish as they saw reason for it without being unjust in either and therefore had not one who pretends to so great and personal an Acquaintance with Christ said so I should rather have thought that God's requiring such a Sacrifice as the death of Christ for the expiation of our sins was not because he could not do otherwise but because his Infinite Wisdom judged this the best and most effectual way of dispencing his Grace But though this be a very terrible discovery of the naturalness of Gods righteousness or vindictive justice yet he makes some amends for it in that comfortable discovery of his patience and long-suffering towards Sinners for now in Christ the very nature of God is discovered to be love and kindness a happy change this from all justice to all love but how comes this to pass why the account of that is very plain because the justice of God hath glutted its self with revenge on sin in the death of Christ and so hence forward we may be sure he will be very kind as a revengful man is when his passion is over for so he speaks very honourably of God whatever discoveries were made of the Patience and lenity of God unto us yet if it were not withal revealed that the other properties of God as his Iustice and Revenge for sin had their actings also assigned them to the full there could be little consolation gathered from the former That is he would not believe God himself though he should make never so many promises of being good and gracious to Sinners unless he were sure that he had first satisfied his revenge which indeed is such a Character of the Love and Patience of God as we could never have understood but from an intimate acquaintance with the Person of Christ. The sum of which is that God is all love and Patience when he hath taken his fill of revenge as others use to say that the Devil is very good when he is pleased But however sinners have great reason to rejoice in it when they consider the nature and end of God's Patience and forbearance towards them viz. That it is Gods taking a course in his infinite wisdom and goodness that we should not be destroyed notwithstanding our sins That as before the least sin could not escape without a just punishment justice being so natural to God that he cannot forgive without punishing so the justice of God being now satisfied by the death of Christ the greatest sins can do us no hurt but we shall escape with a Notwithstanding our sins This it seems we learn from an acquaintance with the Person of Christ though his Gospel instructs us otherwise that without holiness no man shall see God As for the Wisdom of God which is another property he instanceth in no doubt but the Gospel of Christ makes great and glorious discoveries of it but then this is not very consistent with those other discoveries of the nature of God for if justice be so natural to God that nothing could satisfie him but the death of his own Son the redemption of the World by Christ may discover his justice or his goodness but not his Wisdom for Wisdom consists in the choice of the best and fittest means to attain an end when there are more ways than one of doing it But it requires no great Wisdom to chuse when there is but one possible way and whatever Wisdom there is in Gods redeeming the World by his own Son the knowledge of it is wholly owing to the Revelations of the Gospel not to such a fanciful acquaintance with Christ as these men talk of Thus you see what excellent discoveries of the Nature of God are owing to an acquaintance with the Person of Christ And the second thing we learn from hence is the knowledge of our selves and that in respect of Sin and in respect of Righteousness As for sin the Gospel assures us that God is an irreconcileable Enemy to all wickedness it being so contrary to his own most holy Nature that if he have any love for himself and any esteem and value for his own perfections and works he must hate sin which is so unlike himself and which destroys the beauty and perfection of his Workmanship For this end he sent his Son into the World to destroy the works of the Devil and to reduce Mankind to
many more with as fair colours and pretences and as exact and regular proportions and fanciful consequences and artificial connexions I need not tell you what use all our Allegorical Divines would make of this who have the peculiar knack and gift of adapting every similitude and resemblance to what purposes they please We know how the Valentinians of old perverted all the passages of our Saviours Life and Death by such fanciful applications to confirm the doctrine of their Aeones and the portentous production of their Gods and to patronize all their vilest practices and if we allow of this way I know not why one mans fancy should not be admitted as well as anothers But to shew how easily this acquaintance with Christ's Person may be made to serve different purposes I shall oppose another Scheme of Religion which is much more plainly deducible from an acquaintance with Christs Person to what these men advance for the great Mystery of the Gospel and the only spiritual Wisdom And thus I argue Since we see the Eternal Son of God leave his Fathers Throne and condescend to come into the World in the nature and likeness of a man we may certainly conclude that it was upon a design of love and goodness for had he intended to destroy the World he would have Cloathed himself with thunder and lightning he would have appeared like himself with an awful and astonishing Majesty and with all the terrible solemnities of vengeance and judgment incircled with Legions of Angels and with Clouds of smoak and fire but we now see nothing dreadful in his looks nor in his Conversation he was made a Man as we are which argues a good will and kindness to humane Nature he had all the sweetness of innocence and an obliging goodness that we have no reason to suspect any ill design under so charming and inviting an appearance his miracles were great and glorious but not frightful and astonishing they surprized with wonder not with terrour and fear his Almighty Power was displayed and manifested in methods of love and kindness in healing the sick and dispossessing Devils in feeding the hungry and raising the dead not in over-turning Kingdoms and Empires or bringing fire from Heaven to consume his Enemies From all this we may safely conclude that he came upon an Embassy of Peace to assure the World of Gods good will towards them and to reconcile the differences between God and Men. And when we consider further that this Heavenly Embassador and Mediator is no less than the Eternal Son of God by whom the Worlds were made we may reasonably conclude that he came upon no less design than of universal goodness for he can have no temptation to partiality as being equally concerned in the happiness of all men and we cannot imagine why he should lay a narrower design of love in the redemption than in the Creation of Mankind that when in the first Creation he designed all men for happiness in this new and second Creation he should design and intend the happiness only of some few which is to make him less good in redeeming than in creating Mankind though Creation cost him no more than the exercise of his power but redemption the expence of his bloud no sure his goodness did not become less infinite and boundless when he became man the design of his appearing was to restore Mankind to that honour and happiness and immortality they had lost and to repair the sullied glory of the first Creation by making all things new again Thus when we consider the innocence and holiness of his life that he was a great example of an unaffected piety towards God and all the vertues of an innocent and useful Conversation with men we may reasonably conclude that his great design was to reform the debaucht manners of the World to reduce Mankind to the obedience of God to teach man how to live as well as talk and to restore the practice of piety and justice of meekness and humility and an universal good will which had been banished out of the World by the Hypocritical pretences of a more refined sanctity in washing hands and Dishes in tithing Mint and Cumming and such like pieces of legal and Ceremonial Righteousness But now our Saviour by his example as well as laws taught us another Lesson that as we lost our happiness at first by sin so the way to regain the favour of God and an immortal life is by the practice of a sincere and universal righteousness He came to be our example and guide to Heaven as well as our Mediator and Advocate and therefore we must imitate his life if we would enjoy the benefits of his Death and Intercession for so holy a Person can never be the Patron of Vice nor an Advocate for impenitent and incorrigible Sinners When we remember that Christ died as a Sacrifice and propitiation for sin this gives us a great demonstration of Gods good will to us how ready he is to pass by all our former sins in that he hath appointed an atonement for us and given no less person than his own Son for our ransom which is the greatest assurance God could give us of his readiness to accept of true Penitents and therefore the most powerful motive and encouragement to return to our duty And besides this the death of Christ assures us what the desert of sin is and what will be the portion of all impenitent Sinners for in that he required the death of his own Son to be an atonement for sin he hath plainly declared that all Sinners deserve to die and that none shall escape this just Condemnation but those who are washed and purifyed in the blood of Christ He will not pardon sin without a Sacrifice nor accept of any other atonement but the death of his Son and accept of that for none but those who believe and obey the Gospel and if God did not think fit to save true Penitents without a ransom where shall the Sinner and ungodly appear So that though we do not pretend to understand the strict Philosophy of that atonement made by Christ yet we may easily learn all that is useful and necessary for us to know that Christ's Death and Sacrifice for sin Seals the Covenant of Grace and pardon to all penitent and reformed Sinners and seals the irrevocable decree of Reprobation against all others for that Covenant which is sealed with the blood of so great and stupendious a Sacrifice must needs be irrevocable and Eternal In the Resurrection of Christ from the dead and his Ascension into Heaven we have an ocular demonstration of the rewards of holiness and obedience that for the innocence and purity of his life and the humility and obedience of his Death he is now exalted to the right hand of God and cloathed with Majesty and Glory That Power and Authority he is now invested with secures us of the prevalency of his intercession of
his constant care and providence over his Church of the influences of his Grace and the supply of all our spiritual wants and of that glory and happiness to which he will advance us at the last day All this we learn from an acquaintance with Christ's Person as these men call it and it were easie now to draw the whole plot and design of Christianity to search into the deep Councils of God and to discover those principles and motives he was acted by and the infinite Wisdom of the contrivance and the true methods of a Sinners recovery by Christ and what that homage and worship is which we owe our Saviour As to make some short Essay of it Those natural notions which we have of God acquaint us that he is infinitely good and the History of the Creation assures us that God made the World to be an image and representation of his own glory and perfections but especially Man who was made after the image of God and endowed with that Wisdom and Knowledge and all those Principles of Piety and Vertue which would have made him a living and active image of the Divine perfections This was the glory and the happiness of his nature to know God and to be like him to praise and adore his great Benefactor and to be inseperably united to him by those natural tyes of love and obedience For nothing else can be the happiness of a reasonable Creature but Conformity to the Divine Nature which is the pattern and measure of all rational perfections and happiness And therefore when Mankind apostatized from God they miserably defeated the end of their Creation and intercepted those natural Communications of the divine goodness by making themselves unworthy and uncapable of them and now we may easily imagine how much a good God was grieved and offended with this not as a haughty and Imperious Prince would be with the miscarriages and rebellion of his Subjects but as a kind Father is displeased and grieved for the disobedience of his Children for their refractory and unmanageable temper not so much as an affront and contempt of his own Authority but as it is a necessary cause of the ruine and misery of his Children whose happiness he so passionately desires and designs This made the divine goodness so restlesly zealous and concerned for the recovery of Mankind various ways he attempted in former Ages but with little success as I observed before but at last God sent his own Son our Lord Jesus Christ into the World to be the great Shepherd and Bishop of Souls to seek and to save that which was lost And that we may be able in some measure to comprehend the infinite Wisdom and goodness of this contrivance and how well the means is fitted to the end we must consider that the whole Mystery of the recovery of mankind consists only in repairing the Divine Image which was defaced by sin that is in making all men truly good and vertuous Sin is our apostasie from God and doth as naturally make us miserable as it makes us unlike the most happy Being But holiness restores us to our Primitive State to the perfect constitution of our Natures and makes us good and therefore happy as God is And this was the great difficulty to perswade men to be good to work upon the different tempers and inclinations and passions of mankind and to reduce them to the forsaken and untrodden paths of vertue and though the laws and precepts the great promises and threatnings of the Gospel confirmed by so many stupendious miracles and by the resurrection of Christ from the Dead have in themselves a mighty power to reform the World yet the consideration of Christ's Person of what he did and suffered for us gives a peculiar force and energy to them Sin and guilt makes men fearful and it makes them disingenuous they are apt to distrust goodness or to abuse it will either believe God implacable which makes them desperate because there is no hope of pardon or believe him to be fond and indulgent which makes them saucy and presumptuous and to prevent both these extreams of superstition which are such profest Enemies to a sincere and unaffected Religion God sent his own Son into the World and by the greatness of his Person and the manner and circumstances of his appearance did confute them both If guilt make us afraid of God as an angry and severe judge behold here the distance taken in the Incarnation of the Son of God who condescended to come down to us cloathed with our nature as a mild and a gentle Prince by all the methods of love and sweetness to reduce us to our Allegiance and subjection to God in him we see the good will of God to Sinners here is a demonstration of condescending goodness which stooped as low as earth and did not disdain the nature and appearance of a man nor the Conversation of Sinners nor the shame of the Cross nor the pale terrours and agonies of Death and the Grave And to remove all possible suspition concerning Gods love to Sinners the Son of God dies as a Sacrifice for our sins to make atonement for us and with his blood Seals the Covenant of Grace and Pardon and all the promises of Eternal life And still to give us the greater security of the performance of all this our dying and suffering Lord is raised again from the dead and advanced to the right hand of power and Majesty to intercede for us Thus God deals with us after the manner of men and to encourage us to return to our duty hath given us all the security of our acceptance that guilt it self though infinitely jealous and suspicious could desire for what could we wish for more than that God should send so great and so beloved a Person to us on an Embassy of Peace than that the Son of God should be our propitiation and Advocate our Lord and Judge he who took our nature and our infirmities on him who knows our weakness and our temptations who died to expiate our sins and is entred into the Holy of Holies to intercede for us in the vertue of his blood and in the power of his glory and the triumphs of his Conquests and with a tender and compassionate sense of our infirmities But then on the other hand to cure our presumption that we may not think God to be so easie as to be reconciled to Sinners and to their vices together the death of Christ upon the Cross assures us what the merit is and what the portion of sin shall be that all Sinners deserve to die and shall certainly have their deserts without a sincere repentance and reformation of their lives for to expiate sin by death can signifie no less than this that death is the proper recompence of sin and therefore that those sins which are not expiated by the Sacrifice of Christ as none are till we repent and reform shall
clefts of the rocks where this believing Soul Christs Dove hides it self And besides this a Rock is a Screne to shade off the heat so Christ is called Isai. 32. 2. a shadow from the heat he shades a poor Sinner from the scorchings of Gods wrath And then We must fetch comfort too from Christ as honey came out of the Rock Deut. 32. 13. he made him suck honey out of the Rock and oyl out of the stinty Rock the honey of the Promise and the oyl of gladness comes out of this blessed Rock But this is not enough yet for we must be cloathed with the Righteousness of Christ as appears from that expression that we must put-on Christ Rom. 13. 14. Gal. 3. 27. which can signifie nothing else but putting on Jesus Christ that is his righteousness as men put on a Garment to cover their nakedness and to adorn them And therefore Christ is resembled to a beautiful Robe Isai. 61. 10. He hath covered me with the Robe of Righteousness His righteousness is a lovely Robe no Robe of Gold or Ermin wherewith Kings are invested is so honourable as this In this Robe we shine as Angels in Gods Eye The High Priests glorious Vestments Exod. 28. 2. The Mytre the Robe the Ephod of gold and the Breast plate of precious stones did all but serve to set out the beautiful Robes of Christs righteousness wherewith a Believer is adorned thus if we would get the blessing we must go to God as Iacob did in the Robes of our Elder Brother though I confess this resemblance doth not very well please me for though Iacob was a good man yet this looks like a cunning trick to rob his elder Brother of the blessing and to cheat his blind Father and men must not think that God is thus to be impos'd upon But however that be this is plain that when we are thus united to Christ and made one with him then all Christ is ours as the Apostle tells us All is yours and you are Christs and Christ is Gods The merit of his Death is ours to free us from the guilt and punishment of our sins and his Active obedience to the will of God his Righteousness is ours for our justification as is plain in that he is called the Lord our Righteousness and is said to be made unto us of God Righteousness And as I. O. well observes we are reconciled to God by the Death of his Son and saved by his life that is by the Righteousness of his life which is made ours Rom. 5. 10. And now what better proof can you desire for all this if you will be contented with express words Though I am very much of the Doctors mind that we could never have discovered these mysteries clearly and savingly had it not been for an acquaintance with Christs Person No man would ever have dream't of such interpretations of Scripture who had not been prepossest with the mysterious notion of a fanciful Union to Christ and application of Christ to us for here is no other proof of this but words and phrases separated from the body of the Text and the design of the discourse and like straglers pickt up and listed into the service of their Hypothesis For indeed the whole mystery of this and a great deal more stuff of this nature consists in wresting metaphorical and allusive expressions to a proper sense When the Scripture describes the profession of Christianity a sincere belief and obedience to the Gospel by having Christ and being in Christ and coming to him and receiving him these men expound these phrases to a proper and natural sense to signifie I know not what unintelligible Union and spiritual progress and closure of the Soul with him An Union of Persons instead of an agreement in faith and manners As will appear more hereafter Thus when they talk of our spiritual impotency and inability to do any good thing for after all the noise they make about our coming to Christ they mean being carryed thither with an Omnipotent and irresistible power they prove it wonderfully from our being dead in trespasses and sins and therefore as a dead man can contribute nothing to his own Resurrection no more can we towards our Conversion which is true of natural Death but will be hard to prove of a moral Death which consists in the prevalency of vicious habits contracted by long custom which was the case of the Heathens whom the Apostle there speaks of which do so enslave the will that it is very difficult though not impossible for such persons to return to the love and practice of vertue another argument of the like nature is that we are said to be created to good works and to become new Creatures and therefore can contribute no more to it than we did to our first Creation and that we are born again which signifies that we are wholly passive in it which were true indeed if our being created to good works did signifie the manner and method of our Conversion and not the nature of the new Creature which is the true meaning of it that as in the first Creation we were created after the image of God so we are renewed after his image in the second which is therefore expresly called in other places the renewing and renovation of our minds When this way fails they take another course with metaphors and similitudes to make them serve their purpose and that is by considering all the properties and qualifications of those things Christ is compared to and applying all that will serve their turn to Christ without any regard to the end for which they are used Thus the Kingdom of Heaven that is the Gospel is compared to a pearl of great price Mathew 13. 46. This Pearl in some mens Divinity signifies Christ and the excellency of Christ appears plainly in this comparison For other Pearls add no real worth to them that wear them but Christ this Illustrious Pearl doth he makes us worthy with his worthiness Excellently turned to serve their purpose though all that the Parable means is that we should be as ready to part with all for the belief and profession of the Gospel as other men are to sell all they have to purchase a pearl of great value Thus Christ was prefigured by Mannah and this Mannah was of a circular figure and this Circle was a figure of Christs perfection this was meat cooked and drest in Heaven God himself prepared it and then served it in thus Iesus Christ was prepared and set apart of his Father to the blessed work of Mediatorship And Mannah suited it self to every ones Palate thus Iesus Christ suits himself to every Christians condition he is full of quickning strengthening comforting vertue That is he is what every man fancies him to be relishes according to the gusto of their own palates what precious discoveries are here of Christ and what irrefragable proofs
and the peculiar Moods of speaking in every language and in every age and to urge Metaphors no further than their first intention without which we may deal by all Authors as these men deal by the Scripture make them speak non-sence or as they use to call them venerable Mysteries and overthrow and contradict their own design And this is their first way of expounding otherwise called adulterating and debauching Scripture by the sound of words Secondly When this will not do then they argue and reason about the sense of Scripture from their own preconceived notions and opinions of Religion pretend to prove their own Scheme and fancies of Religion from the Scripture but in truth prove the sense of the Scripture by its agreement with their own opinions which is such a trick as the Papists have got to prove the Authority of the Church from the Scripture and the Scripture from the Church I might give Instances of this in abundance but I shall mention only some few lest I tire my self and my Reader Thus after all their talk of being justified by the imputation of Christs Righteousness there are a great many places of Scripture which expresly tell us that we are justified by Faith have Remission of sins by Faith have peace with God by Faith are sanctified by Faith are the Sons of God by Faith have Eternal Life and are saved by Faith now how do you think shall all these Scriptures be reconciled to their notion of being justified by the imputation of Christs Righteousness for Faith certainly is not the Righteousness of Christ in their notion of it why this is plain at first sight to these acquaintances of Christ. For when Faith is said to justifie and save c. we must not understand this absolutely that is we must not understand this of Faith considered as Faith but we must understand it relatively that Faith justifies as it brings us to Christ and makes us one with him by whom we are justified Faith apprehends the Righteousness of Christ and the Righteousness of Christ justifies now this distinction is plainly owing to their preconceived opinions without which no man could ever have stumbled on 't that when the Scripture saith that Faith justifies the meaning should be that it justifies and saves instrumentally and relatively words which the Scriptures are unacquainted with that is not as it is Faith but as it apprehends the Righteousness of Christ which in plain words signifies that Faith does not justifie though the Scripture so often says it does But now the Reason of this Interpretation is very plain for should Faith justifie as our own Act that is as Faith it would be as bad as good works and as perfectly irreconcileable with the free Grace of God For had justification been promised to any thing wrought in us or done by us it had been of desert not of Grace of wages not of mercy if God had promised justification upon any work of ours had said we must bring so much humiliation so much repentance so much breaking of Spirit so much Grace so many Prayers Alms-deeds or so much Faith as our own Act and then we should be justified it would not have been of Grace not of free mercy though modest men who are not so apt to dream of meriting by every thing they do would have thought that free Grace and Faith might have been easily reconciled though Faith had justified as our own Act since the reward and recompence does so infinitly exceed the work that there can be no suspition of merit and where there is no merit the Reward is of Grace and not of debt whatever the condition of the promise be But this is past all doubt when it is confirmed by a metaphor or two of which there is great variety some more apt than others as for Instance the vertue is not in Faith but in Christ as appears in this a Ring which hath a precious stone in it which will staunch blood we say the Ring stauncheth blood but the vertue doth not barely lye in the Ring but in the stone in the Ring so Faith is the Ring Christ the precious stone all that Faith does is to bring home Christs merits to the Soul and so it justifies so that if you can but find out an improper and absurd form of speech in use among the vulgar or if you can but invent one as this Gentleman does for I never met with this before it is a sufficient reason to expound Scripture as improperly as unlearned men talk or think or if you can but fancy Faith a Ring and Christ a precious Stone it is enough to answer all those places of Scripture which speak of that legal and meritorious way of justification by Faith And thus Faith justifies as it is a receptive Grace it is the receiving the Gold that enriches so Faith receiving of Christs merits and filling the Soul with all the fulness of God must needs be an enriching Grace In the body there are Veins that suck the nourishment that comes into the Stomach and turns it into blood and Spirits Faith is such a sucking Vein that draws vertue from Christ and therefore is called a precious Faith Is not this very plain now to him who understands the nature of our Union to Christ which is like that of the Members of a natural body and that we are saved by Christ just as the body is nourished by the Stomach And now to make all clear we may give a Philosophical account why God chose Faith to be the Instrument of our Justification because it is a humble Grace and gives the glory of all to free Grace If repentance should fetch justification from Christ a man would be ready to say this was for my tears strange deserving Creatures these who can dream of meriting Heaven with a few tears but Faith is humble it is an empty hand and what merit can there be in that doth a poor mans reaching out his hand merit an Alms yes just as much as a few tears merit Heaven Faith is only a golden Bucket that draws Water out of the well of life But why may not those who are so apt to be conceited of merit grow as proud that they have a golden Bucket as if the whole Well were their own Thus you see how these men deal with the Scripture and poor humble Faith make what they please of them to fit them to their purpose that Faith is sometimes feet to go to Christ sometimes a hand to receive him a mouth to feed on him an eye to look fiducially on him a Ring to hold this precious Stone a Vein to suck justification out of the Spiritual Stomach which by the way is a very new conceit for though Christ is called the head I never before read that he was the Stomach a Bucket to draw water out of this Well Christ though in this they are very civil to Faith in making it a
such but as they are members of his body for he is the Saviour of the body and Redeemed his Church with his own blood Hence St. Iohn tells us in his first Ep. Ch. 1. Ver. 3. That which we have seen and heard the whole Doctrine and History of the Gospel declare we unto you that you also may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Iesus Christ. First that ye may have fellowship with us become members of the Church of Christ by which means you have fellowship and Communion with God and Christ. And therefore those publick censures whereby rotten or dead members are cut of from the body of Christ consist in casting such persons out of the Society of Christian people in debarring them from the Communion of Prayers and Sacraments and all Religious offices which is a plain demonstration that our Union to Christ is not an Union to his Person of which more hereafter but consists in a sincere and spiritual Communion with the Christian Church otherwise this external Communion with the Church could be no visible signification of our Union to Christ nor could our excision from the visible Church signifie our separation from him But thirdly It will be requisite now to explain more particularly the nature of this Union between Christ and the Christian Church which is not a natural but a Political Union that is such an Union as is between a Prince and his Subjects Christ is a spiritual King and all Christians are his Subjects and our Union to Christ consists in our belief of his Revelations obedience to his Laws and subjection to his Authority Hence our Saviour tells the Jews if you continue in my words then are ye my Disciples indeed John 8. 31. which is the same thing with being in him and by keeping his Commandments we abide in his love Iohn 15. 10. 14. 21. and to have his word abide in us is a description of the closest and firmest Union to him Iohn 15. 7. As obedience to our Prince is the strongest bond of a Political Union which is dissolved and broken by disobedience and Rebellion Thus our Saviour calls himself a Shepherd and Christians his Sheep Iohn 10. to signifie that Authority he hath over his Church which bears some Analogy to the government of a Shepherd which is oft-times used as a name of power and Authority as God is styled the Shepherd of Israel Psalm 80. 1. and Kings are frequently called Shepherds both by prophane and sacred Writers Though this name is most commonly given to Prophets who feed and instruct the Church which includes power and Authority and so does very properly belong to our Saviour who erected this spiritual Kingdom on the Foundation of his Doctrine and Laws and by the exercise of his prophetical office for which Reason he is called the Shepherd and Bishop of our Souls Thus he is called a Head and the Church his Body a Husband and the Church his Spouse which two metaphors signifie the same thing and are both of them names of power and Authority as appears from Eph. 5. 23. c. For Husbands are said to be the head of their Wives as Christ is the head of the Church and are commanded to love their Wives as their own bodies as Christ loves his Church so that a Husband as a Husband represents the head and the Wife the body and what the meaning of all this is the Apostle plainly tells us that Christ is called the Head and Husband because he hath the Rule and Government of us and therefore exhorts Wives to be subject to their Husbands as the Church is subject unto Christ the Spiritual Head v. 24. For because the Head in the natural body hath the command and government of all the members hence Head is a common name for Princes and Governours Deutr. 28. 13. The Lord shall make thee the Head and not the Tayl and thou shalt be above only and thou shalt not be beneath that is thou shalt rule and govern Psalm 18. 43. Thou hast made me the Head of the Heathen and a people whom I have not known shall serve me And therefore the Apostles always expound this metaphor of Christ's being a Head by power and Authority Eph. 1. 20 21 22. Hath set him at his own right hand in Heavenly places far above all Principalities and Powers and hath put all things under his feet and gave him to be Head over all things to the Church which is his body Col. 1. 18. And he is the Head of the body the Church who is the beginning the first born from the dead that in all things he might have the preheminence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is that he might not only excel other things but that he might rule and govern them for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies him who hath the first place of Authority because government is naturally entailed on the greatest excellency and perfection Thus Christ is the Head of all Principalities and powers that is their Lord and Governour Col. 2. 10. This is the true explication of this relation betwixt Christ and his Church He is the Head and Husband because he is invested with Authority to govern and the Church is his body and Spouse because it must be obedient to his Laws and subject to his Government as we know it is very familiar to call a Society of men who live under the same Laws and Civil Government a body Politic which signifies their subjection to the same Authority as a body hath but one Head and that regard they must have to the preservation of the whole and their mutual care of each other as members of the same body Now the true Reason why this spiritual Kingdom of Christ is described by the Authority of a Shepherd over his Sheep and of a Head and Husband over his body and Spouse is to signifie the mildness and gentleness of his government and that great and near concern he hath for the welfare of his Church that he governs his Church with the care and tenderness of a Shepherd that he defends and ransoms his Church with his own blood as a good Shepherd lays down his life in defence of his Sheep Iohn 10. That he loves his Church with the natural kindness of a Head or Husband that his Government is only for the good of his Church not for his own private advantage as a kind Husband exerciseth no other Authority over his Wife but what is for her good as well as his own or as the Head hath no other concern but that all his members be preserved in their natural State and vigour and perform their proper and natural offices and therefore we may be secure that his yoak is easie and his burden light that he will be gentle in his Discipline and favourable in his censures especially when we consider how dearly he hath purchast this relation to his Church
renounce the authority of our Head and Husband now as it is in an Army should any Captain revolt from his Prince the Souldiers under his Command are not bound to turn Rebels because their Leader is so or should a whole Troop or Regiment conspire in the Treason no particular Souldier is obliged to continue in the Company or submit to the Government of Rebels no more than he is obliged to be a Rebel the same reason holds good as to Christian Societies if any particular Church apostatize from the Faith of Christ we are then under the same necessity of deserting their Communion as we are of obeying the Laws and submitting to the Authority of our Lord and Master but nothing less than this can justifie a separation while the Church is subject to Christ we must be subject to the Church while the fundamental Laws of his spiritual Kingdom are observed and his Institutions reverenced and the great ends of his Religion advanced to separate from such a Church is to separate from the Body of Christ for our Union to Christ consists in a subjection to his Authority and it is plain that we disowne his Authority when we reject those who act by his Authority Now this Political Union betwixt Christ and his Church may be either only external and visible and so hypocrital Professors may be said to be united to Christ or true and real which imports the truth and sincerity of our obedience and subjection to our Lord and Master For since Christianity is become the Religion of Nations and is entailed on us by our Ancestors as part of our inheritance is received into the Laws and Constitutions of Kingdoms and made a great Instrument of Civil Government it is too often seen that many men undertake this Profession only as the Mode and Fashion of their Country to avoid singularity and to serve a worldly interest And thus the Christian Church is filled with Hypocrites and visible Professors who are great Strangers to the life and spirit of the Holy Iesus while some under the name of Christians practise all the villanies of the Heathen World and live in a publick defiance to the Laws of that Religion they pretend to owne others make a fair show of external conformity to the Laws and Constitutions of this spiritual Kingdom and conceal their impurities under some glorious and pompous form of Religion and pass for very good Christians when they are no better than disguised Hypocrites and this makes it necessary to distinguish between a meer external and real Union between those who do no more than make a visible profession of Christianity and those who are true and sincere Christians Earthly Princes can exact only an external conformity to their Laws because they can take no cognizance of the secret workings of mens minds and the end of their Government is attained in the preservation of publick peace and order But the spiritual Kingdom of our Lord is of another nature which requires not only an external and visible subjection to Christ our Head and Husband and a visible Union to the Christian Church but the homage and obedience of the Soul the government of our thoughts and passions the renovation of our minds and spirits We must be born again of Water and of the Spirit if we would enter into the Kingdom of God Ioh. 3. 5. That is before we can be the Disciples of Christ the Subjects of his spiritual Kingdom which is in Scripture called the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven we must be born of water must make a publick profession of our Faith in Christ and obedience to Him in our Baptism but this is not sufficient unless we be born of the Spirit too that is unless our minds and spirits become subject to Christ unless our Faith in Christ and subjection to Him be sincere and hearty do govern all the motions and desires of our Souls and make us really such as we pretend to be which is called Being born of the Spirit because all Christian Graces and Vertues are in Scripture attributed to the Spirit of God as the Author of them Hence the Apostle tells us that In Christ Iesus nothing availeth but a new Creature that is that none are true Subjects of Christ such as shall be rewarded by Him but those whose minds and spirits are transformed into the love of vertue and goodness Now as a visible Profession of Christianity is the Foundation of this external-political Union betwixt Christ and his Church so this new Nature is the Foundation of a real and spiritual Union and this the Scripture represents to us under several notions First by the subjection of our minds and spirits to Christ as our spiritual King when we put our Souls as well as Bodies under his Government and Conduct hence Christ is said to dwell in our hearts by faith Eph. 3. 17. that is to have the sole Command and Empire of our wills and affections to govern our hearts as a man does the house in which he dwells And thus all those Metaphors which signifie our subjection to Christ must be expounded of the subjection of our Souls and Spirits to Him as well as the outward conformity of our actions because Christ is a spiritual King who rules and governs hearts as earthly Princes govern the bodies of their Subjects our subjection to him ought to begin in the Soul in a sincere acknowledgment of his Power and Authority in a stedfast belief of his Doctrines and Revelations and in a chearful and willing obedience to his Laws such a subjection as a Wife ought to yield to her Husband and Members to their Head the effect of a free choice not a feigned or forced compliance Secondly By a participation of the same nature which is the necessary effect of the subjection of our minds to him for the Gospel of our Saviour is the truest image of his mind he transcribed his own nature into his Laws and therefore a sincere obedience to his Laws is a conformity to his Nature Hence is that exhortation That the same mind be in us which was in Christ Iesus Phil. 2. 5. and to be his Disciples is to learn of him who was meek and lowly in mind Matth. 11. 29. Hence also our Union to Christ is described by having the Spirit of Christ. Rom. 8. 9. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his that is unless he have the same temper and disposition of mind which Christ had which is called having the Spirit of Christ by an ordinary figure of the cause for the effect for all those vertues and graces wherein our conformity to Christ consists are called the fruits of the Spirit the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness righteousness and truth Eph. 5. 9. and therefore what the Apostle in that place calls having the Spirit of Christ in the next verse he expresses by if Christ be in you i. e. if you
be possest with the same love of vertue and goodness which appeared so eminently in him which is much to the same sense with that expression of Christs being formed in you Gal. 4. 19. My little Children of whom I travel in birth again till Christ be formed in you that is till you be thoroughly instructed in the Doctrine and Religion of Christ and are thereby moulded into his likeness and image Hence in the 1 Cor. 6. 17. the Apostle tells us He that is joyned to the Lord is one Spirit that is herein consists our Union to Christ that we have the same temper of mind which he had for there can be no Union betwixt Souls and Spirits without this that they are acted by the same Principles and love and chuse the same things bodies are united by an external adhesion of parts but Souls by an harmony and consent of wills This makes two one Spirit when there is a perfect likeness of disposition when they agree in the same designs as much as if the same Soul animated them both when we love God and men as our Saviour did when we are meek and humble and patient and contented as he was we are as closely united to him as if he dwelt in us and we in him as if we had but one Spirit in us both But Thirdly there is a closer Union still which results from this which consists in a mutual and reciprocal love When we are transformed into the image of Christ he loves us as being like to him and we love him too as partaking of his nature He loves us as the price of his blood as his own workmanship created to good works and we love him as our Redeemer and Saviour Now love is the great Cement of Union which unites interests and thereby does more firmly unite hearts hence when our Saviour had told his Disciples At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father and you in me and I in you Joh. 14. 20. he explains the meaning of it in v. 21. He that hath my Commandments and keepeth them he it is that loveth me and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father and I will love him and manifest my self unto him That is God and Christ and Christians are all united by a mutual and reciprocal love founded on a likeness of dispositions and actions on obedience to those Laws which are but a Copy of the Original Holiness of God and of the life of Christ. To the same purpose Christ prays for his Disciples Ioh. 17. 21. that they may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us Which refers to their agreement in doctrine and love Thus according to the Scripture phrase love makes us one with God and Christ and with each other Fourthly This Union is exprest in Scripture by resembling the Christian Church to Gods Temple wherein he dwells as formerly he did in the Temple at Ierusalem while that typical and ceremonial Worship was in force God was pleased to dwell in a Temple made with hands there he placed the Symbols of his Presence from thence he gave forth his Oracles there he received their Sacrifices and Oblations and returned an answer to their prayers But since Christ hath introduced a more manly and spiritual Worship God dwells no longer in a Temple of wood and stones by such visible signs of his presence as formerly he did but hath chosen the society of devout minds and pure souls for the place of his residence and abode Thus in the 1 Cor. 3. 16. Know you not that ye are the Temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you and Chap. 6. vers 19. Know you not that your body is the Temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you which ye have of God and 2 Cor. 6. 16. Ye are the Temple of the living God as God hath said I will dwell in them and walk in or among them and I will be their God and they shall be my people To the same purpose we find in Rev. 21. 3. that after the description of the Holy City the New Ierusalem coming down from God out of Heaven which signifies the state of the Christian Church there was heard a great voice out of Heaven saying Behold the Tabernacle of God is with men and he will dwell with them and they shall be his people and God himself shall be with them and be their God Now all this must be expounded in allusion to the Temple at Ierusalem that as the Temple was the place of Gods peculiar presence with that people signifying that he was always ready at hand to assist them in their distress to supply their wants to defend them from their enemies to hear all the pious prayers they put up to him that is that he would be their God and they should be his people as the Apostle expounds it thus it is now with the Christian Church they are the only society of men whom God hath a peculiar regard for with whom he is always present whom he protects and defends by a vigilant and more particular providence whom he hath chosen for his peculiar people to dwell among them And as in the Temple God placed the Mercy-seat and the Cherubims as Emblems of his Majesty and Presence for which reason he is so often said to dwell betwixt the Cherubims so he hath now bestowed his holy Spirit on the Christian Church which is a surer pledge of his dwelling among them than those Types and Shadows were as the Apostle speaks Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you or among you that is this is a sufficient evidence that ye are the Temple of God in that God hath given his Spirit to dwell with you which primarily refers to those extraordinary gifts of the Spirit which God in that Age bestowed on the Christian Church this was the true Shecinah or divine glory resting on them for which reason he is called the Spirit of Glory 1 Pet. 4. 14 The Spirit of Glory and of God resteth on you that is that Spirit of God which is the visible manifestation of his glory in the Christian Church of which that visible glory which sometimes filled the Jewish Tabernacle was an Emblem Hence S. Paul tells us that the glory of the new Covevant which is the ministration of the Spirit which was confirmed by such miraculous and plentiful effusions of the holy Spirit did far exceed the glory of the first Covenant written and engraven in stones though that was so glorious that the Children of Israel could not stedfastly behold the face of Moses because of the glory of his countenance 2 Cor. 3. 7 8. for this was a glorious manifestation of a divine Presence with the Church that God did indeed dwell with them and walk among them and though these extraordinary gifts are now ceased yet
the vertue and glory of them still remains they are a lasting demonstration of Gods peculiar presence with his Church in all Ages as they are of the truth of the Christian Religion for the Christian Church in all Ages since Christ and his Apostles is but one and therefore still inherits the glory as well as the Religion of former Ages In allusion to this the Christian Church is called Gods Building 1 Cor. 3. 9. and Eph. 2. 20 21 22. and are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Iesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth into an holy Temple in the Lord in whom ye are also built together for an habitation of God through the Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is a Spiritual Temple in opposition to the material Temple at Ierusalem which S. Peter calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a spiritual House or Temple 1 Pet. 2. 5. all which refers to this notion that the Christian Church is Gods Temple wherein he dwells Now though all this do most properly belong to the Christian Church as a spiritual Society that they are the Temple of the living God yet it is accommodated in Scripture to particular Christians and Philo also alludes to it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the mind of a wise and good man is in truth and reality the Palace and Temple of God every devout Soul is Gods Temple wherein he dwells an enlightned mind which is stored with all the treasures of divine wisdom and knowledge is his Debir or Oracle a pure heart is his Altar and devout prayers are spiritual incense and sweet perfumes the body it self is a consecrated place and is also called the Temple of God which must therefore be preserved pure and undefiled 1 Cor. 6. 19. nay our bodies are Sacrifices too which we must offer up to God by devoting them to his service Rom. 12. 1. for the Scripture loves to allude to the Temple and Aliar and Sacrifices of the Law which in a moral sense may very well be accommodated to the Christian Worship and Service as in their Typical signification they prefigured Christ whose Body was the true Temple where the Divine Glory dwelt who was both Priest and Sacrifice and by his death put an end to that Typical Dispensation only we may observe that when the Scripture mentions Gods or Christs dwelling with particular Christians it uses a more familiar style and seems rather to allude to a private house than a publick Temple Thus in Ioh 14. 23. If any man love me he will keep my words and my Father will love him and we will come unto him and make our abode with him and Rev. 3. 20. Behold I stand at the door and knock if any man hear my voice and open the door I will come in to him and sup with him and he with me This is all I can find in Scripture concerning the Union betwixt Christ and Christians and that this is the true account of it besides what hath been already urged will evidently appear from those Institutions of our Saviour which are the Instruments and Symbols of our Union to him which we commonly call Sacraments Baptism and the Lords Supper which represent and signifie both our external and real Union with him First our external Union Thus Baptism is a publick profession of the Christian Religion that we believe the Gospel of Christ owne his Authority and submit to his Government We are baptized in the Name of Christ that is we publickly owne him for our Instructor and Governour to believe whatever he hath taught and to do whatever he hath commanded And the Lords Supper is a foederal Rite which answers to the Feasts on Sacrifices under the Law whereby we renew our Covenant with our Lord and vow obedience and subjection to him hence these Institutions were by the Ancients called Sacraments in allusion to that Oath which Souldiers took to be true and faithful to their Prince when they were listed into his Army which was called Sacramentum Militiae or the Military Oath of this nature are Baptism and the Lords Supper a Vow and Covenant to be subject to Christ as our Head and Husband wherein our external and visible Union consists Secondly They signifie also our real Union to Christ thus Baptism signifies our profession of becoming new men our profession of conformity to Christ in his Death and Resurrection We are buried with Christ by Baptism into death that like as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father even so we also should walk in newness of life Rom. 6. 4. that is Baptism or our immersion under water according to the ancient Rite of administring it is a figure of our burial with Christ and of our conformity to his death and so signifies our dying to sin and walking in newness of life for the death of Christ must be considered not barely as a natural death a separation of soul and body but as a Sacrifice for sin to destroy the power and dominion of it and so our dying to sin that is ceasing from the practice of it is the truest conformity to the death of Christ and we must consider his Resurrection not only as his returning to life again but as his living to God his advancement into his spiritual Kingdom the design of which is to promote the interest of Religion and a divine life and so our walking in newness of life a vertuous and religious life is our conformity to his Resurrection makes us the true Subjects of his spiritual Kingdom which the Apostle tells us gives us an abundant assurance of a glorious resurrection that we shall in a proper sense rise with him because this new life wherein our spiritual Conformity to the resurrection of Christ consists is an immortal principle of life which can no more die than Christ can die again now he is risen from the dead Thus Baptism is called putting on Christ Gal. 3. 27. He that is baptized into Christ hath put on Christ that is hath engaged himself to be conformed to his image and likeness to adorn his mind with all those vertues and Graces which appeared in our Saviours life Thus the Lords Supper is a spiritual feeding on Christ eating his flesh and drinking his blood which signifies the most intimate Union with him that we are flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone Eph. 5. 30. That as we are redeemed by his Death and sufferings are the purchase of his blood and so as it were taken out of his Crucifyed body as the Woman was taken out of the Man so by this spiritual feeding on Christ we are transformed into the same nature with him as much as if we were of his flesh and bones This is a Sacrament wherein we celebrate the love of our dying Lord and express our most passionate love and devotion to him The memory of what he hath done
and suffer'd for us excites a just hatred of our sins sincere purposes and resolutions of a new life to live to him who died for us a great hope in God who hath provided such a Sacrifice and Atonement such a Mediator and Advocate for us and a stedfast expectation of a future reward This is eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Christ when these visible figures of his Death and Sufferings affect our minds with such a strong and passionate sense of his love to us and excite in us such a firm hope in God as transforms us into a divine Nature and this is our real Union to Christ as you heard above Now I take it for granted that there can be no better way to understand the nature of our Union to Christ than to consider the nature of those Sacraments which were designed as the Instruments and signs of our Union to him and if we will take that account the Scripture gives of them all the Union they signifie is only a publick and visible profession of our Faith in Christ and subjection to him as our Lord and Saviour and a sincere conformity of our hearts and lives to the nature and life of Christ. Fourthly I observe further that fellowship and Communion with God according to the Scripture notion signifies what we call a Political Union that is that to be in fellowship with God and Christ signifies to be of that Society which puts us into a peculiar relation to God that God is our Father and we his Children that Christ is our head and Husband our Lord and Master we his Disciples and followers his Spouse and his body thus in Iohn 1. 1. 3. That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you that you also may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Iesus Christ where I observe that our fellowship with the Father and Son is first founded on our fellowship with the Christian Church that is on our profession of the Faith of Christ obedience to his Laws subjection to his Government and Discipline which he now visibly exerciseth by the Bishops and Pastors of the Church this unites us into one Society and body politick and now by vertue of our fellowship with the Christian Church we have fellowship with Christ who is the supreme Head and Governour of his Church which is a plain argument that all the Apostle means by fellowship with God and Christ is such a Political Union as is between a Prince and his Subjects between Superiours and Inferiours in the same Society Now as you heard before if this profession be only external and visible without the conformity of our hearts and lives to the laws of Christ it gives us only an external fellowship or relation to God and Christ that is such men only appear to be in fellowship with Christ maintaining a visible fellowship with his Church when in truth they are perfect strangers to him such as Christ will not owne for his Disciples as the Apostle adds in Ver. 6. 7. If we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness we lye and do not the truth but if we walk in the light as God is in the light then have we fellowship one with another c. That is we abuse our selves if we hope that God will owne himself our Father and bestow the inheritance of Children on us while we live in sin but when we join the practice of real righteousness with the visible profession of Christianity then God will owne us for his Children and Christ for the true members of his body So that this fellowship with God and Christ is such a state and condition as we are put into by a visible profession and sincere practice of Christianity and that in short is that we are united to God as his Sons and Children and are united to Christ as his Disciples and members of his body which intitles us to the Inheritance of Children and all the blessings of the Gospel Thus in the 1 Cor. 1. 9. God is faithful by whom ye are called into the fellowship of his Son Iesus Christ our Lord where the fellowship of Christ can signifie no more than the fellowship of the Christian Church whereof Christ is Lord and Head and therefore the Apostle immediately adds in the next Verse Now I beseech you Brethren by the name of our Lord Iesus Christ for the honour and reputation of Christ and his Religion that you all speak the same thing that there be no divisions nor Schisms among you but that you be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment Where he argues from the nature of their Faith in Christ to the obligations of Peace and Unity which plainly evinces that this fellowship with Christ is that relation we stand in to him as Members of the Christian Church whereof he is Head And that the true notion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render sometimes by Fellowship sometimes by Communion is as plain as we can wish in 2 Cor. 6. 14. where the Apostle disswades them from having any fellowship with Heathen Idolaters from eating of their Sacrifices c. Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers that is have no society with those men whose Religion is so contrary to yours that you will be as uneasie to each other as two Heifers in the same yoke which draw different ways For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what is there common between them which they both alike partake of as a foundation of union and concord What communion hath light with darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies the same thing what is there common to them both What concord hath Christ with Belial 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what consent and harmony of mind to unite them into one fellowship What part hath he that believeth with an unbeliever 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which seems to refer to those portions of Sacrifices which were distributed among them as a Symbol of their Union to each other and to the same God How can a Believer and Unbeliever a Christian and an Idolater have right to a part of the same Sacrifice What agreement hath the Temple of God with Idols 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what is there to unite them together in the same place to reconcile the Temple of God with the Worship of Idols All these expressions decypher to us the nature and foundation of fellowship the nature of it consists in the union of things which in rational Beings consists in mutual relations and common interests and the foundation of it is a likeness of nature and consent and harmony of wills and therefore the Apostle explains our fellowship with God by our being the Temple of God and that God dwells in us and walks in us Vers. 16. 18. Now because the Lords Supper is the only Act which the
Scripture mentions whereby our fellowship with God and Christ in this World is exprest hence it is called the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Communion and fellowship 1 Cor. 10. 16. The Cup of blessing which we bless is it not the Communion of the blood of Christ The Bread which we break is it not the Communion of the body of Christ And why he calls it the Communion appears from the following verses First because it signifies the Communion and fellowship of Christians with each other that they are all Members of the Body of Christ that they are all the Children of the same Father as being entertained by him at the same Table vers 17. And Secondly It is a Communion also as it signifies our fellowship with God Vers. 18. Behold Israel after the flesh are not they which eat of the Sacrifice partakers of the Altar The meaning of which is that the Sacrifice which was offered upon the Altar was reckoned as Gods meat as the Temple was his house and therefore those that eat of the Sacrifice were entertained at Gods Table which was a signification of their fellowship with him that he was their God and they his people Thus the Lords Supper is a Feast upon a Sacrifice even that great and stupendious Sacrifice of the Body of Christ which was offered upon the Cross and therefore to eat the consecrated Bread and drink the Wine which are the figures of his Body and Blood is to eat of that Sacrifice that spiritual food God hath provided for us Thus God entertains us at his Table as his own Children who are of his houshold and family as the Members of Christ who have a right to all the blessings of the new Covenant which was sealed with his blood This is the true Interpretation of all Feasts upon Sacrifice such as the Lords Supper in an eminent manner is that it is to eat of Gods food and to be entertained at his Table which is such an argument of our fellowship with God as eating and drinking together is among men always allowing for that infinite distance which is between God and us This is the only Act of Religion which in Scripture signifies Communion and Fellowship because it is the most proper signification of our fellowship with God and with each other but prayer and meditation and such like Acts of Devotion are no where called Communion with God though a prevailing custom hath in our days almost wholly appropriated that name to them fellowship with God doth not consist in transient Acts but is a state of life that relation we stand in to God and Christ and there is no Act of Religion which doth properly signifie this fellowship with God but only eating at his Table for you will not say that a poor man enjoys communion and fellowship with his Prince when he puts up a Petition to him to beg his charity or praiseth him for his clemency and bounty to pray to God is an Act of Homage which we owe him as he is our Maker and Father it is a duty which results from our relation to and fellowship with God but it is not in its own nature an act of fellowship and communion which expression I purposely avoid not only because it is improper and hath thrust out the true notion of our fellowship with God and not only the notion but the practice of it too for certainly did men understand what our fellowship with God is they would not so much neglect the Lords Supper which is the only Act whereby our Communion is exprest but also because men have abused it to great irreverence and familiarity with God in their addresses to him while they fancy that they are now acting the part of Gods Fellows and therefore may talk to him with such freedom as they use in common conversation I have discoursed these things at large because they are too commonly mistaken our Union to Christ hath been represented as a Riddle and Mystery which no body can understand the perfect knowledge of which must be reserved for the next World or the coming of Elias and the mistakes about it have had a bad influence upon all Religion not only to confound the notions but to debauch the practice of it The sum of what I have already said is this that those Phrases and Metaphors which represent our Union to Christ signifie our visible Society with the Christian Church and our sincere practice of the Christian Religion when we joyn in Communion with the Church of Christ and live in a regular subjection to our spiritual Governours and a mutual discharge of all Christian offices when we profess to believe the Gospel and to obey the Laws of our common Saviour then we are visibly united to Christ as Subjects to their Prince and Members to their Head and when this profession is sincere and hearty when we really are what we pretend to be then our Union to Christ is real and spiritual too A visible and real Union to Christ differ as a visible Professor and sincere Christian the one is a Christian only in show the other is what he pretends to be and this Union to Christ entitles us to his peculiar care and providence to the influences of his Grace to the power of his Intercession transforms us into his nature and likeness and makes us the Temple of God wherein he delights to dwell All this may be understood on this side Heaven and without sending for Elias to unriddle it and this is all the Scripture tells us of our Union to Christ. SECT II. Of our Union to the Person of Christ. I Know not whence it comes to pass that men love to make plain things obscure and like nothing in Religion but Riddles and Mysteries God indeed was pleased to institute a great many Ceremonies and many of them of very obscure signification in the Jewish Worship to awe their childish minds into a greater veneration of his Divine Majesty But in these last days God hath sent his own Son into the World to make a plain and easie and perfect Revelation of his Will to publish such a Religion as may approve it self to our reason and captivate our affections by its natural charms and beauties and there cannot be a greater injury to the Christian Religion than to render it obscure and unintelligible and yet too many there are who despise every thing which they understand and think nothing a sufficient tryal of their Faith but what contradicts the sense and reason of mankind I might give you too many instances of this but our present Argument may serve instead of many There is nothing more easie to be understood than our Union and Communion with Christ and it had certainly continued so had not some men undertook to explain it who have now made it more than mystical that is an unintelligible Union though indeed that is the least fault that it cannot be understood for as they have
in for a share at least in being the Fountain of Grace though the Dr. is pleased to take no notice of him But how excellent is the Grace of Christs Person above the Grace of the Gospel For that is a bounded and limited thing it is a strait gate and narrow way that leadeth unto life there is no such boundless mercy as all the sins in the World cannot equal its dimensions as will save the greatest the oldest and the stubbornest transgressors Thus the Love of Christ is an eternal Love because his Divine Nature is eternal and it is an unchangeable Love because his Divine Nature is unchangeable and his love is fruitful for it being the love of God it must be effectual and fruitful in producing all the things which he willeth unto his Beloved he loves Life Grace Holiness into us he loves us into Covenant loves us into Heaven This is an excellent Love indeed which doth all for us and leaves nothing for us to do we owe this discovery see you to an Acquaintance with Christs Person or rather with his Divine Nature for the Gospel is very silent in this matter All that the Gospel tells us is that Christ loved sinners so as to dye for them and that he loves good men who believe and obey his Gospel so as to save them and that he continues to love them while they continue to be good but hates them when they return to their old vices and therefore I see there is great reason for sinners to fetch their comforts not from the Gospel but from the Person of Christ which as far excels the Gospel as the Gospel excels the Law But methinks this is a very odd way of arguing from the Divine Nature for if the love of Christ as God be so infinite eternal unchangeable fruitful I would willingly understand how sin and death and misery came into the World For if this Love be so eternal and unchangeable c. because the Divine Nature is so then it was always so for God always was what he is and that which is eternal could never be other than it is now and why could not this eternal and unchangeable and fruitful love as well preserve us from falling into sin and misery and death as Love Life and Holiness into us for it is a little odd first to love us into sin and death that then he may love us into Life and Holiness which indeed could not be if this Love of God were always so unchangeable and fruitful as this Author perswades us it is now for if this Love had always loved Life and Holiness into us I cannot conceive how it should happen that we should sin and dye Not that I deny that the Love of God is eternal unchangeable fruitful that is that God was always good and always continues good and manifesteth his love and goodness in such ways as are suitable to his Nature which is the fruitfulness of it but then the unchangeableness of Gods love doth not consist in being always determined to the same object but in that he always loves for the same reason that is that he always loves true vertue and goodness where-ever he sees it and never ceases to love any person till he ceases to be good and then the immutability of his Love is the reason why he loves no longer for should he love a wicked man the reason and nature of his Love would change And the fruitfulness of God's Love with respect to the Methods of his Grace and Providence doth not consist in producing what he loves by an omnipotent and irresistible power for then sin and death could never have entred into the World but he governs and doth good to his Creatures in such ways as are most suitable to their natures He governs reasonable Creatures by Principles of Reason as he doth the material World by the necessary Laws of Matter and bruit Creatures by the Instincts and Propensities of Nature From hence he proceeds to shew how desirable Christ is in his Humanity by reason of his freedom from all sin both Original and Actual and his fulness of Grace that all Grace was in him for the kinds thereof and all degrees of Grace for its perfection This indeed doth represent him as a very excellent Person a spotless Sacrifice and a great Example to the World but these personal perfections cannot pass out of his Person to become ours But then Thirdly you must consider That all these perfections of the Divine and Humane Nature are united in one Person and this made him fit to suffer and able to bear whaetever was due unto us which no Creature could do for if the weight of our sins had been laid upon a meer innocent Creature how would they have overwhelmed him and buried him for ever out of the presence of God No doubt the Sacrifice of Christ who was God-Man was of greater value than the Sacrifice of any meer Creature could be but I know not what this is to his purpose and do as little admire his Philosophy But his being God and Man made him an endless bottomless Fountain of Grace to all that believe This he was as God as we were told before and his Grace was never the more bottomless for becoming Man The design you see of all this is to make the Person of Christ the Fountain of all Grace from whence we must drink pardon and mercy as long as we need any and such mercy too as his Gospel is unacquainted with he hath a fulness of all Grace in himself and from thence we must receive the communications of it And this brings me to the second sort of the Personal Graces and Excellencies of Christ his fulness to save from the Grace of Communion or the free consequences of the Grace of Union As for this Grace of Communion as he is pleased to call it though it sounds a little harsh to be a Personal Grace and yet communicated whereby Christ communicates his fulness to Believers I shall reserve it for its proper place and shall at present only consider what this Personal fulness in Christ is which he calls all the furniture he received from the Father by the Unction of the Spirit for the work of our Salvation and near of kin to this is his third Personal Grace his Excellency to endear from his compleat suitableness to all the wants of the souls of men There is no man whatever this sounds like universal Redemption that hath any want in reference to the things of God but Christ will be unto him that which he wanteth is he dead Christ is life is he weak Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God hath he the sense of guilt upon him Christ is compleat Righteousness the Lord our Righteousness many poor Creatures are sensible of their wants but know not where their remedy lies Indeed whether it be life or light power or joy all is wrapt up in him Now
appears from Rom. 9. 30. Israel which followed after righteousness hath not attained to the law of righteousness wherefore because they sought it not by Faith but as it were by the works of the law that is the Israelites who pursued so earnestly after Righteousness are excluded from righteousness or forgiveness of sins and are under a Curse because they did not look for Righteousness and Justification in the way which God prescribed which is by Faith in Christ or by Christianity but by the observance of the law of Moses Now the most obvious Reason why this righteousness of the law is called their own righteousness and the Righteousness of Faith Gods Righteousness is because this legal righteousness was a way of justification not of Gods appointment but their own chusing God never designed that any man should be justified to eternal life by observing the law of Moses but yet they confidently expected justification by that Law and for that reason rejected the Gospel of Christ But the righteousness of Faith is a righteousness of Gods chusing this he approves and accepts of for the justification of a Sinner by this the Elders obtained a good report by this Enoch and Noah and Abraham were justified before God and therefore this may well be called the Righteousness of God because this he appointed and this he will owne and reward Thus you see that there is no foundation in Scripture for all this talk of a Personal Righteousness of Christ inherent in him and imputed to us but the righteousness of which the Scripture speaks is not the righteousness of Christs Person but of his Gospel that is that way of Righteousness and Justification which Christ hath revealed in his Gospel I have now considered all the Personal Graces of Christ as these men call them and upon inquiry it appears that what they appropriate to his Person belongs to his Gospel and is intended to describe the perfection and excellency of his Religion as being the most perfect Revelation of the will of God the most powerful method of his wisdom for the reforming the World the only way to life and immortality and which prescribes the only Righteousness which is acceptable to God There is indeed one metaphorical expression still behind which exercises mens wits and fancies viz the riches of Christ Eph. 3. 8. Which must needs be a personal Grace too or Personal Estate or what you will call it unto me who am the least of all Saints is this Grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. Where by the unsearchable riches of Christ is meant the Gospel which St. Paul preached to the Gentiles as being ordained by Christ to be the Apostle of the Gentiles and he calls it unsearchable riches because the Grace of the Gospel is not a narrow and stinted thing is not confined to a particular Nation as the law was but is offer'd to all Mankind whether Jews or Gentiles bond or free the Gospel of Christ contains those glorious discoveries of Gods goodness to all Mankind as may well be called the riches of his Grace Eph. 1. 7. for riches signifie only an abundance And is it not a great violation of the Majesty of Scripture to sport and toy with words and metaphors as some men do with this riches of Christ that he is rich because he hath a rich dowry having all the World given to him as his proper Inheritance that he keeps open House and maintains all the Creation at his own charge and that he hath done this above 6000 years which would have broke him long since had he not been very rich and that he doth not only inrich all the Saints but all of the Saints their understandings with glorious light their Consciences with quickness pureness c. and that after all this vast expence he is never the poorer that he is not a penny the poorer for all that he hath laid out for the relief of those that have their dependance on him And that Iesus Christ is generally rich rich in Houses and Lands though he had not a place whereon to lay his head in gold in silver in Cattel in all temporals as well as spirituals and that he hath a great Tribute and Rent due to him that he is the great Landlord and Owner of all that Angels and men possess above and below These are fine things to perswade young Women to accept of Christ for their Husband since they can never expect so rich and advantageous a match any where else but I have something else to do than to pursue such follies and extravagancies as are so palpable that there is no need to expose them SECT III. Concerning the nature of our Union to Christ whereby we are intitled to all his fulness Righteousness c. HAving showed you what kind of Person these men make of Christ how they have fitted him to all the wants and necessities of a Sinner let us now consider wherein this Union they talk of between the Person of Christ and the Persons of Believers does consist Now the Union betwixt Christ and Christians is represented in Scripture by various metaphors which I have explained at large but these men instead of explaining these metaphors turn all Religion into an Allegory As for example Christ is called an Husband and the Church his Spouse and now all the invitations of the Gospel are Christs wooing and making love to his Spouse and what other men call believing the Gospel of Christ whereby we devote our selves to his service these men call that consent and contract which makes up the marriage betwixt Christ and Believers Christ takes us for his Spouse and we take Christ for our Husband and that with all the solemnities of marriage except the Ring which is left out as an Antichristian Ceremony Christ saying thus This is that we will consent unto that I will be for thee and thou shalt be for me and not for another Christ gives himself to the Soul with all his excellencies righteousness preciousness graces and eminencies to be its Saviour Head and Husband to dwell with it in this holy Relation and the Soul likes Christ for his excellencies Graces suitableness far above all other Beloveds whatever and accepts of Christ by the will for its Husband Lord and Saviour and thus the Marriage is compleated and this is the day of Christs Espousals of the gladness of his heart and now follow all mutual conjugal affections which on Christs part consist in delight valuation pity or compassion and bounty on the Saints part in delight valuation Chastity duty which is much like Mr. Hobs his Description of his Artificial Man the Common-wealth But I have already corrected this fooling with Scripture-Metaphors and Phrases and my business at present is to consider wherein they place the nature of this Union betwixt Christ and Believers namely in this that it is such an Union as makes all Christ ours
bestows the rewards of Righteousness on those who according to the strictness and rigour of the Law are not Righteous that for Christ's sake he hath made a new Covenant of Grace which pardons our past sins and follies and rewards a sincere though imperfect obedience for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be made righteous is the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be justified that is treated like righteous persons so that the Righteousness of Christ is not the formal cause of our justification that very Righteousness whereby we are righteous but the Righteousness of his Life and Death is the meritorious cause of that Covenant whereby we are declared righteous and rewarded as righteous persons for the Apostle tells us in Ver. 17. who those are who are thus justified by Christ and shall Reign with him in Life not those who are righteous by the imputation of Christs Righteousness to them but those who have received the abundance of Grace and the gift of Righteousness that is who by the Gospel of Christ which is the Grace and the abundant Grace of God are made Holy and Righteous as God is which Righteousness is called a gift because it is not owing solely to humane endeavours but is wrought in us by supernatural means by those powerful arguments and motives and divine assistances which God in infinite love and goodness has afforded the World by Jesus Christ. This gives a fair account how we may be said to be made righteous by the Righteousness of Christ not that his actual obedience is reckoned as done by us which is impossible but because we are made righteous both in a proper and forensick sense by the Gospel-Covenant which is wholly owing to the Grace of God and to the merits and Righteousness of Christ the great arguments and motives and powerful assistances of the Gospel form our minds to the love and practice of Holiness and so make us inherently righteous and the Grace of the Gospel accepts and rewards that sincere and Evangelical obedience which according to the rigour and severity of the Law could deserve no reward so that our Righteousness is wholly owing to the Righteousness of Christ which may in this sense be said to be imputed to us though that phrase never occurs in Scripture because without this Covenant of Grace which is founded on the Righteousness of Christ the best man living could lay no claim to Righteousness or future glory So that the Righteousness of Christ is our Righteousness when we speak of the foundation of the Covenant by which we are accepted but if we speak of the terms of the Covenant then we must have a righteousness of our own for the Righteousness of Christ will not serve the turn Christs Righteousness and our own are both necessary to our Salvation the first as the foundation of the Covenant the other as the condition of it The sum of this Section is this that there is no foundation in reason or Scripture to imagine any such Union betwixt Christ and Believers as should intitle them to all the personal Righteousness of Christ as much as if it had been performed by themselves but the vertue of Christs Obedience and Sufferings so far as it concerns our justification is contained in the Gospel-Covenant he is the Mediator of the Covenant and his blood is the blood of the Covenant and we must expect no other advantage from what Christ hath done and suffer'd but to be saved according to the gracious terms and conditions of the Gospel SECT IV. That these men place our Union to Christ before holiness of life I Have now explained to you the nature of our Union to the Person of Christ as these men represent it whereby they say we are entitled to all his Excellencies Graces Righteousness Preciousness c. and made it appear that there is no foundation for such a notion either in Scripture or reason but before I dismiss this it will be convenient to take notice of the great evil and mischief of this opinion which may satisfie any considering man though there were no other evidence of it how false it is and I shall observe two things to this purpose First That according to this notion men may nay must be united to Christ while they continue in their sins which according to my understanding overthrows all Religion and destroys the necessary obligations to an holy life Secondly That according to these mens discourses no man can certainly tell how to get into Christ or know whether he be in Christ or not As for the first that men may nay must be united to Christ while they continue in their sins it is easie to produce abundant evidence for the proof of it Mr. Shephard tells us expresly that obedience does not make us Gods people or God our God but he is first our God which is only by the Covenant of Grace and hence it is that he being ours and we his we of all others are most bound to obey as for the obligation to obedience we will consider that anon at present it suffices that we are Gods people and that by vertue of the Covenant of Grace before we obey him the same Author tells us that we are not united to Christ our life by obedience as Adam was to God by it but by Faith that is by such a Faith of which Obedience is no part otherwise he opposes a part to the whole and so the same thing to it self and therefore as all actions in living things comes from Union so all our acts of obedience are to come by Faith from the Spirit on Christs part and from Faith on our part which make the Union the meaning of which is this that we must first be united to Christ by this Faith of which more anon before we can do any thing that is good before this Union the best actions we can do are sins which is a plain demonstration of the truth of this charge because according to this principle we can do nothing but sin before we are united to Christ hence these men constantly place our justification before our sanctification that we are first accounted holy by God before we are made holy now our justification follows our Union to Christ and our fanctification follows our justification and therefore we must first be united to Christ so as to have a title to all the Promises of the Gospel to Justification and Eternal Life before we are sanctified that is before we are made Holy hence we are told that Holiness is a remote end of vocation but the next end is to come to Christ and the same Author makes a speech for Christ to a Sinner so gracious a speech that among all the invitations of Christ in the Gospel we find nothing like it though thou hast resisted my Spirit refused my Grace wearied me with thy iniquities yet come unto me and this will make me amends I require nothing of thee
never come And when the Soul hath this particular call suppose it should suspect this call for a delusion what course can it take to satisfie it self that this is the call of the spirit of God and not the cheat and imposture of an enthusiastick fancy truly none that I know of if this calling by name will not satisfie it there is no other way but to call for the Book of Election and see whether its name be enrolled there the best of it is that all that are called must come and therefore they need inquire no further But secondly Though we know not how to get into Christ it would be some comfort to know that we are in him but this is as impossible as the other as the only foundation of our Faith in coming to Christ according to these mens notions is this special and particular call of the Spirit so the only infallible assurance any one can have that he is in Christ is the testimony of the Spirit that Spirit of adoption which teaches us to cry Abba Father and yet God does not afford this testimony of the Spirit to all but suffers many good Christians to walk in darkness and hides his face from them and conceals the evidences of his eternal love for no other reason but because they are desirous of it and would be quiet if they should know it this is somewhat hard measure but suppose you have or think you have this testimony of the Spirit how can you be sure that it is not a cheat and delusion the imposture of the Devil or of your own self-flattering imaginations To satisfie this scruple we are directed to marks and evidences and thus this infallible assurance from the testimony of the Spirit must in its last resolve be founded upon some moral evidence as it is with the Church of Rome who after a great noise and cry of infallibility are at last forc't to resolve their Faith into some motives of credibility or to dance round in an endless circle Well but let us consider what are the marks and evidences of our being in Christ and now you must inquire whether you have the Spirit of Christ and it is just as easie to know this as whether you be in Christ But are you true Believers is your Faith of the right stamp is it wrought by the Almighty Power of God or is it such an easie common presumptuous false Faith as that which is in the generality of men and this is as easie to know as either of the former for if there be such a false presumptuous Faith as takes Christ when he does not belong to us and rests and relies on Christ only for pardon life and Salvation and yet shall never have Christ how shall we know whether our Faith be true and genuine such as will make Christ ours and the answer to this brings us to that great mark of sanctification you must consider the effects of Faith doth it purifie your heart doth it overcome the World doth it work by love if any man be in Christ he is a new Creature are you then new Creatures is the state of your person changed from a Child of wrath to an Heir of Grace which is the thing to be proved or is your nature changed do you not think speak act as you did before do ye walk in newness of life c. have you crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts do you bring forth fruit as every branch in Christ which is not rejected by him doth that is you must prove your justification by your sanctification your Faith by your Works It must be acknowledged that these are some of those marks and Characters which the Scripture gives of good Christians by which we may as certainly know what our state is as the Tree is known by its Fruit and since it is no better I am heartily glad it is no worse that good works and a holy life may at least put in for marks and evidences of a justified state though the truth is this is a meer complement to holiness and as they order the matter a holy life can no more be the sign of a justified state than it can justifie us For first since holiness is not necessary to our Union with Christ it can be no necessary sign of it we are united to Christ before we are holy as appears from what I have already discoursed and therefore an unholy man may be united to Christ and how then can holiness be the only sure mark of our Union to Christ indeed they tell us that holiness does necessarily follow our Union to Christ but no man knows how long it may be before it follows and yet all this while such a Person is united to Christ at best this gives evidence but to one part of the question a holy life may be a good evidence that such a man is in Christ but the want of it is no certain evidence that a man is not in Christ and therefore this mark may be rejected by any one who hath no mind to it Nay secondly According to these mens principles we cannot tell whether we are holy or not till we know whether we are in Christ or not our Union to Christ must be an evidence of our holiness not our holiness an evidence of our Union to Christ till we are united to Christ we can do nothing to please God the best actions of Christless and unregenerate men are but splendida peccata glittering impieties which may appear so fair and lovely that they may deceive both other men and themselves for the true fruits of the Spirit but yet are odious and abominable to God because the person who does them is out of Christ our persons must be first accepted in Christ and then our services we cannot judge of holiness by the external performance of any duty nor by the inward sense of our own minds but must first know whether we are in Christ whether our persons be accepted in him before we can tell whether any thing we do be good and acceptable to God and this is a plain demonstration that holiness cannot be an evidence of our Union to Christ because we must first know our Union to Christ before we can know that we are holy And thirdly At other times these men make the work of sanctification in this life so imperfect and so like an unsanctified state that it is impossible to distinguish a sanctified and unsanctified man and upon this account holiness and sanctification must needs be a very sorry evidence of our Union to Christ when it is so imperfect that it cannot be known for that which is an evidence of another thing ought to be very evident it self An unregenerate man is under the Law of Sin under the reigning power of it and a regenerate man as they describe him is in a state as like this as one Egg is like another for a regenerate man may
this is a wonderful love but wherein the excellency of it consists I cannot see I am sure we account that man a Fool who loves at this rate we who are reasonable Creatures think that we are bound to govern all our actions and the passions of our mind too by reason and we account it a reproach to a man to act either against reason or without it to do any thing of which he cannot give a reasonable account and how that should come to be the perfection of the love of God which is a reproach to men is above my apprehension Indeed were this true it would undermine the very foundations of Religion for the great end of Religion is to please God and to procure his love and favour but if God and Christ love for no reason then it is a vain thing for us to think of pleasing God or procuring his love by any thing we can do whether we obey him or disobey him it is all one as to this Case for if he please to love us without any reason our sins cannot hinder it and if it does not please him to love us our Holiness and Obedience cannot alter him when our acceptation with God depends wholly upon a Soveraign and unaccountable will nothing we can do can either hinder or promote it and therefore all Religion is in vain The foundation of this mistake is a Philosophical nicety that God must act wholly from himself and therefore must not be moved by any external cause whereas should he love us because we are holy and obedient to him or hate us because we are wicked his love and hatred would depend upon an external cause viz. the holiness or wickedness of Creatures which unbecomes an Independant being to depend upon any thing else the sum of which reasoning is this that because God is the first cause of all things on whom all other things depend and he on nothing therefore he must love and hate his Creatures without any reason but his own unaccountable will for this is all the inconvenience they can object that when God loves or hates rewards or punishes his Creatures the reason of this difference he makes between his Creatures must be fetcht from the persons themselves whom he thus loves or hates and so it must of necessity be if he have any reason at all for the reason of love or hatred ought to be in the object not in the person who loves or hates and yet in propriety of speech God cannot be said to depend on his Creatures or any thing without himself for the reason of his love or hatred but his own nature is the reason of it he is infinitely holy and therefore loves holiness and hates sin and his natural love to holiness is the reason why he loves holy men and his natural hatred to sin is the reason why he hates wicked men his own holiness is the reason why he loves holy men but the holiness of a Creature is the reason why he determines his love to any particular person and if they will call this a depending on Creatures we must acknowledge that God does thus depend on his Creatures in the administration of his Providence in the distributions of rewards and punishments and he should not be wise and holy and just and good if he did not that is if he did not put such a difference between things and persons as their natures require It is a strange notion of an Independant Being that he must have no other reason for what he does but his own arbitrary will which is so far from being a perfection that it destroys all the other perfections of the divine nature Secondly These men tell us too that the love of Christ is immutable that having once fixt his love upon us though without any reason he can never alter that sin it self cannot separate us from the love of Christ as there was nothing in us that was the ground of his planting his love on us so there is nothing that shall be able to overturn the thoughts of his love when once they are fixt on us though this is no certain demonstration for he who loves for no reason may give over loving for none if sin fore-seen were not able to hinder him from planting his heart on us how then shall it that is sin committed be able to overturn the thoughts of his heart when once they are fixed on us this is a strong and fixed love indeed which sin it self cannot alter but how wise and holy a love it is let any man judg herein Dr. Owen tells us the depth of Christs love is to be contemplated that whereas his holy Soul hates every sin it is a burden an abomination a new wound to him and his poor Spouse that is sinful Believers are full of sin failings infirmities he hides all covers all bears with all rather than he will loose them He adds indeed by his power preserving them from such sins as a remedy is not provided for in the Covenant of grace I suppose he means the sin against the Holy Ghost for there is a remedy provided for all other sins in the Covenant of Grace and all other sins a Believer it seems may be guilty of and Christ will hide all cover all rather than lose him now this is as down right Antinomianism as ever Dr. Crisp or Saltmarsh vented There have been and are to this day a great many wise and learned men who contend earnestly for the perseverance of the Saints that those who are once in a state of Grace shall always continue so but then they found this not on such an immutable love as sin it self cannot alter for this is not reconcileable with the holiness of the divine nature nor with those threatnings in the Scripture against such back-sliders when the righteous man turneth away from his righteousness and committeth iniquity and doth according to all the abominations that a wicked man doth shall he live all the righteousness that he hath done shall not be mentioned in his trespass that he hath trespassed and in his sin that he hath sinned in them shall he die Ezek. 18. 24. And if any man turn back my Soul shall have no pleasure in him which is a plain demonstration the truth of which is acknowledged by all sober Writers that if such men can be supposed to relapse into a sinful state God also will cease to love them and therefore they found the immutability of Gods love to them on their perseverance in doing good God loves all good men but if they cease to be good he also must cease to love and herein the immutability and unchangeableness of Gods love consists not that he always loves the same Person but that he always loves for the same Reason for it is no perfection to be so fixt in our kindness that where we love once we will always love whatever reason there may be to alter our affection for
by this means we may love undeserving objects which is the greatest degeneracy of love but the perfection of love consists in loving deserving objects and in loving upon honourable reasons and the immutability of love consists in loving always for the same reason which is the only foundation of a vertuous immutability The reason of Christs love to any Person is his Holiness and Obedience if any man love me he will keep my words and my Father will love him and we will come unto him and make our abode with him Iohn 14. 23. and the unchangeableness of his love is seen in this that he will continue to love while we continue to obey him if ye shall keep my Commandments that is continue to do so ye shall abide in my love I will continue to love you as I have kept my Fathers Commandments and abide in his love Iohn 15. 10. This is the immutability of the divine nature that God always acts upon steddy and constant principles that whatever changes there are in the World which may occasion very different administrations in his providence yet he is the same still and never changes whereas should God always love the same Person however he changed and alter'd God must change and alter too because though he still loves the same Person yet he must love for different or contrary reasons or for none at all and that is the much greater change of the two to alter the reason than the object of love if God love a good man because he is good and continue to love him when he is wicked his love is a mutable thing which can love goodness or wickedness which can love for none or for contrary reasons but if God always love true goodness and good men and never loves any other whatever change there be in Creatures God is the same still and unchangeable in his love Thus you see while these men pretend to admire and magnifie the love of God and Christ they make it a despicable and worthless thing such as a wise man would be ashamed of and such as a good man cannot be guilty of to love for no reason and to continue to love contrary to reason And as this is a great reproach to God and to our Saviour so is it a great injury to men too for it must of necessity make them careless of pleasing God and secure in their sins when they are perswaded that sin cannot hinder God from loving them nor alter his love towards them that if ever he love them it is for no reason but because he will and when once he is resolved upon it the immutability of his nature makes it necessary for him to continue to love that now sin it self cannot separate us from the love of God if this were true the worst man living would have as much reason to be secure of Gods love as the best men have nay if the depth and mystery and glory of the love of Christ consists in loving for no reason or contrary to reason the worse men are the fitter objects are they of the love of Christ. SECT II. Concerning the Believers love to Christ. HAving showed you wherein the Love of Christ consists I shall now consider what are those returns of love which we owe to our Lord and Saviour I take it for granted that all men who believe that Christ came into the World to save Sinners are of the Apostles mind if any man love not the Lord Iesus let him be Anathema Maranatha the only dispute is how we are to express our love to Christ now love primarily signifies the inward affection of the mind but is made visible by outward actions as for the affection of the mind we must consider that Christ is our Superiour our Lord and Master and therefore our love to Christ ought not to express it self in a fond and familiar passion such as we have for our friends and equals but in a great reverence and devotion Superiours must be treated with honour and respect which requires that we keep our distance and therefore our love to our Parents and Superiours is called honour in the fifth Commandment Honour thy Father and thy Mother and the same religious affection to God which is sometimes called love is at other times called fear which signifies a reverential love or a love of honour and reverence and devotion which includes a great delight in the thoughts of God a devout sense of his greatness and Majesty a great admiration of his Excellencies and perfections a religious awe and reverence for him and all those affections of the Soul which are expressive of love and honour As for the external expressions of our love they are as various as the expressions of honour are and herein we must have a peculiar regard to the nature and condition of the Person and that relation we stand in to him thus Christ being the only begotten Son of God we must have regard to the greatness and excellency of his Person that our returns may bear some proportion to it Christ having condescended to come into the World in our nature to suffer and die for us it becomes us to admire his love and goodness to extol and praise him to celebrate the memorials of his Death and Passion in that holy Feast which he hath on purpose instituted to be a thankful remembrance of our Crucified Lord since he is our Mediator and Advocate the truest expression of our love and honour is to confide and trust in him to depend on his intercession for us to offer up all our Prayers to God in his name and to expect an answer to our Prayers for his sake and when we consider him as our Prophet and Law-giver we must express our love to him in a stedfast belief of his Gospel and in a sincere and hearty obedience to all his Laws love to equals who have no authority over each other but what love gives them makes them very flexible and obsequious to each others desires and requests but our love to Superiours to our Prince or Parents includes obedience in its own nature and therefore this our Saviour makes the principal tryal of our love to him if you love me keep my Commandments and he that hath my Commandments and keepeth them he it is that loveth me but he that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings you are my friends if you do whatsoever I command you Joh. 14. 15. 23 24. and in Chap. 15. vers 14. for there cannot be a more proper expression of our love and honour to a Law-giver than to obey his Laws And when we consider our Saviour as our Guide and Example the truest expression of our love and honour is to imitate him to live as he lived in the World For there is nothing more natural than to imitate what we love and reverence which is the plainest demonstration of the greatest honour in that we think it our perfection and happiness
Iesus Christ fast and pray and get a full tide of affections in them to carry thee to the Lord Iesus Christ that is to get more love of him more acquaintance with him more Union with him so sorrow for thy sins that thou maist be more fitted for Christ that thou maist prize Christ the more use thy duties as Noahs Dove did her Wings to carry thee to the Ark of the Lord Iesus Christ Or as it is with a poor man that is to go over a great water for a treasure on the other side though he cannot fetch the Boat he calls for it and though there be no treasure in the Boat yet he useth the Boat to carry him over to the treasure so Christ is in Heaven and thou on Earth he doth not come to thee and thou canst not go to him now call for a Boat though there is no grace no good no salvation in a pithless duty yet use it to carry thee over to the treasure the Lord Iesus Christ. When thou comest to hear say Have over Lord by this Sermon when thou comest to pray say Have over Lord by this Prayer to a Saviour c. So that it seems the whole business of our love to Christ and Evangelical Righteousness consists in some flights of fancy and imagination in admiring and valuing the person of Jesus Christ in getting an acquaintance with him and Union to him and the business of all Religion is to have over to Christ that we may love and prize his person and personal Righteousness above all things in the World It is not so much the business of Sermons to acquaint us with the nature and attributes works and providences of God and to instruct us in our duty to him and to encourage us to the practice of it by all the motives and arguments of the Gospel as to have over to Christ to acquaint us with his fulness and Righteousness and alsufficiency to save us without such a legal Righteousness of our own the design of Prayer is not so much to affect our Souls with a sense of the divine Majesty and greatness to worship and adore the great Creator of the World and to express our trust and affiance in him as to have over to Christ to fetch pardon and life and health and Righteousness from him that sorrow for sin is not so much to imbitter sin to us and to confirm and strengthen our resolutions against it as to teach us to prize and value the person of Christ more who is our Righteousness in a word the nature and design of Religion is now changed from being the homage and worship of God the certain means of pleasing him and transforming us into his nature and likeness which is the natural end of Religion into a Cock-Boat or Skuller to wast us over to Christ. Here we see the true reason why these men do so much despise morality in comparison with those Gospel duties of hearing Sermons and Prayer and Confession and Humiliation and Fasting c. Because as they handle the matter the practice of moral vertues cannot have us over to Christ cannot apply the Righteousness and fulness of Christ to us nor ravish our fancies with glorious images and Idaeas of his person and since all the duties of Religion are such pithless things which have no grace no good no salvation in them but as they have us over to Christ poor morality must needs be a worthless thing Thus I have finisht my designed task and upon a review of it it makes me amazed to think how strangely these men have transformed the Religion of our Saviour and disfigur'd the Gospel of Christ how they have undermined the fundamental design of the Gospel which is to make men good and vertuous and like to God how they have misrepresented the ends of Christ comeing into the World and abused his expiation and Sacrifice and Righteousness and Intercession to the Patronage of Vice and Wickedness how they have laid snares to betray some men to a licentious life and to entangle others in endless troubles and perplexities of mind how under a pretence of advancing the person of Christ they have in effect through ignorance and mistake and want of consideration for I am not willing to suspect any worse cause banisht his Religion out of the World I have faithfully and impartially stated the case examined their proofs from Scripture and reason and the result of all is no more but this that the only way to please God and to save our Souls is to obey the Precepts of the Gospel trusting in the mediation of our Lord Jesus Christ who having perfected the work of our redemption is become the Author of Eternal Salvation to all them that obey him FINIS See Ch. 1. concerning the significa of the name Christ. Digr 2 Of the Excellency of Christ Iesus p. 89 〈…〉 Digr 2. p. 93. Ibid. p. 95. Ib. p. 97. P. 110. P. 112. P. 117. Digr 2. p. 119. Shepards sound Believer p. 80. * Watson's Christs Loveliness pag. 462. Watson's Christs Loveliness p. 467. Watson's Christian Character p. 60. The Spiritual Vine p. 167. Shepards sincere Convert p. 77. Watson's Christs Loveliness p. 462. I. O. Communion p. 63. * Of the Knowledge of Christ p. 19. Watson's Christs Loveliness Idem Watson Ibidem 〈◊〉 1 Watsons Christs Loveliness Idem Christs Loveliness Watson ibidem Watson's true brazen Serpent Watson's Spiritual Vine Watsons Christs Loveliness Watson Mystery the Lora Supper p. 64. Idem p. 65. Ibidem Dr. Owen's Communion with Christ Ch. 8. I. O. Excellency of Iesus Christ. Digr 2. p. 113. Ibidem p. 119. I. II. Thomas Vincent III. IV. Dr. Jacomb on Rom. 8. pag. 42. Pag. 45. Pag. 48. Pag. 49. Commun with Christ pag. 51. Ibid. p. 52. Pag. 64. Communion with Iesus Christ pag. 53. Communion p. 54. Communion with Iesus Christ. p. 55. Brooks Riches of Christ. Dr. Owen Com. 1. Dr. Owen Com. p. 60. Dr. Iacomb Rom. 8. p. 85. 2. Ibid. Communion with the Son Chap. 6. p. 182. Communion with the Son p. 178. Commun pag. 182. Pag. 184. Pag. 183. Pag. 181. Communion p. 183. Communion p. 182. Communion p. 185. Communion p. 167. Communion p. 184. * Dr. Owen's Communion p. 193. * Sound Believer p. 321. * P. 318. * P. 212. * Sound Believer p. 68. * P. 86. P. 85. P. 82. * P. 12◠P. 125. P. 141. * P. 128. P. 130. P. 152. P. 173 P. 185. * Chap. 3. * Sound Believer p. 126. * P. 133. * P. 137. * P. 138. * P. 144. * P. 145. P. 153. Sincere Convert p. 75. Ibidem P. 85. * Sound Believer p. 246. Ibidem p. 215. * Sound Believer p. 130. Dr. Iacomb Rom. 8. p. 65. * Rom. 8. p. 182. * Ibidem Shephards Saints Iewel pag. 192. Shephards sincere Convert p. 94 c. P. 167. * Ch. 4. Sect. 1. P. 186. * Ch. 4. Sect. 1. * Com. p. 158. W. B. Christs Personal excellency the object of our love p. 15. W. B. ibid. Shephards sincere Convert p. 4. ed. 1672. Pag. 84 Pag. 109. Communion p. 165. Shephards sincere Convert pag. 197. Sincere Convert pag. 170. I. O. Com. p. 63. Ibid. pag. 154. Pag. 140. Chap. 4. Sect. 2. Shephards sincere Convert pag. 173 Pag. 178.