it self upon its God and Father Father into thy hands God is the center of all gratious Spirits While they tabernacle here they have no rest but in the bosom of their God When they go hence their expectation and earnest desires are to be with him It had been working after God by gratious desires before it had cast many a longing look heaven-ward before but when the gratious soul comes near its God as it doth in a Dying hour then it even throws it self into his arms As a River that after many turnings and windings at last is arrived to the Ocean it pours it self with a central force into the bosom of the Ocean and there finishes its weary course Nothing but God can please it in this world and nothing but God can give it content when it goes hence It is not the amoenity of the place whither the gratious soul is going but the bosom of the blessed God who dwells there that it so vehemently pants after Not the Fathers house but the Fathers arms and bosom Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit Whom have I in heaven but thee And oâ— earth there is none that I desire in comparison of thee Psal. 73.24 25. Thirdly It also implies the great value believers have for their souls That 's the pretious treasure And their main solicitude and chief care is to see it secured in a saâ—e hand Father into thy hands I commit my Spirit they are words speaking the believers care for his soul. That it may be safe what ever becomes of the vile body A believer when he comes nigh to death spends but few thoughts about his body where it shall be laid or how it shall be disposed of he trusts that in the hands of friends but as his great care all along was for his soul so he expresses it in these his very last breathings in which he commends it into the hands of God It is not Lord Jesus receive my body take care of my dust but receive my spirit Lord secure the Jewel when the Casket is broken Fourthly These words implie the deep sense that dying believers have of the great change that is coming upon them by death when all visible and sensible things are shrinking away from them and failing They feel the world and the best comforts in it failing Every creature and creature comfort failing For at death we are said to fail Luk. 16.9 Hereupon the soul clasps the closer about its God clings more close than ever to him Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit Not that a meer necessity puts the soul upon God Or that it cleaves to God because it hath then nothing else to take hold on No no it chose God for its portion when it was in the midst of all its outword enjoyments and had as good security as other men have for the long enjoyment of them but my meaning is that although gratious souls have chosen God for their portion and do truly prefer him to the best of their comforts yet in this compounded state it lives not wholly upon its God but partly by faith and partly by sense Partly upon things seen and partly upon things not seen The creatures had some interest in their hearts alas too much but now all these are vanishing and it sees they are so I shall see man no more with the inhabitants of the world said sick Hezeckiah hereupon it turns it self from them all and casts it self upon God for all its subsistance Expecting now to live upon its God intirely as the blessed Angels do And so in faith they throw themselves into his arms Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit Fifthly It implies the attonement of God and his full reconciliation to believer by the blood of the great sacrifice Else they durst never commit their souls into his hands For it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God Heb. 12.29 i. e. of an absolute God a God unattoned by the offering up of Christ. The soul dare no more cast it self into the hands of God without such an attoning sacrifice than it dares approach to a devouring fire And indeed the reconciliation of God by Jesus Christ as it is the ground of all our acceptance with God for we are made accepted in the beloved So it 's plainly carried in the order or manner of the reconciled souls committing it self to him for it first casts it self into the hands of Christ then into the hands of God by him So Stephen when dying Lord Iesus receive my Spirit And by that hand it would be put into the Fathershand Sixthly And lastly It implies both the efficacy and excellency of Faith in supporting and relieving the soul at a time when nothing else is able to do it Faith is its conduct when it is at the greatest loss and distress that ever it met with It secures the soul when it is turned out of the body When heart and flesh fail this leads it to the rock that fails not It sticks by that soul till it see it safe through all the territories of Satan and safe Landed upon the shore of Glory and then is swallowed up in vision Many a favour it hath shewn the soul while it dwelt in its body The great service it did for the soul was in the time of its espousals to Christ. This is the marriage knot The blessed bond of union betwixt the soul and Christ. Many a relieving sight secret and sweet support it hath received from its faith since that but surely its first and last works are its most glorious works By faith it first ventured it self upon Christ. Threw it self upon him in the deepest sense of its own vileness and utter unworthiness when sense reason and multitudes of temptations stood by contradicting and discouraging the soul. By faith it now casts it self into his arms when it 's lanching out into vast eternity They are both noble acts of Faith but the first no doubt is the greatest and most difficult For when once the soul is interessed in Christ it 's no such difficulty to commit it self into his hands as when it had no interest at all in him It 's easier for a child to cast himself into the arms of its own Father in distress than for one that hath been both a stranger and enemy to Christ to cast it self upon him that he may be a Father and a friend to it And this brings us upon the second enquiry I promised to satisfie sc. What warrant or incouragement have gratious souls to commit themselves at death into the hands of God I answer much every way all things encourage and warrant its so doing For First This God upon whom the believer rolls himself at death is its Creator The Father of its being He created and inspired it and so it hath relation of a creature to a Creator yea of a creature now in distress to a faithful Creator
Prophet precisely faithful and exact in all things that God gave him in charge even to a pin of the Tabernacle Moses verily was faithful in all his house as a Servant for a Testimony of those things which were to be spoken after But Christ as a Son over hiâ— own house Heb. 3.5 6. Again Moses confirmed his Doctrine by miracles which he wrought in the presence and to the conviction of gain-sayers Herein Christ our Prophet is also like unto Moses who wrought many mighty and uncontrolled miracles which could not be denyed and by them confirmed the Gospel which he Preached Lastly Moses was that Prophet which brought Gods Israel out of literal Egypt and Christ his out of spiritual Egypt whereof that bondage was a figure Thus he is described by his likeness to Moses his Type Thirdly He is described by his Stock and Original from which according to the flesh he sprang I will raise him up from among thy brethren Of Israel as concerning the flesh Christ came Rom. 9.5 And it 's evident that our Lord sprang out of Iudah Heb. 7.14 He honoured that Nation by his Nativity Thus the great Prophet is described Secondly Here is a strict injunction of obedience to this Prophet Him shall ye hear in all things c. By hearing understand obedience So words of sence are frequently put in Scripture to signifie those affections that are moved by and use to follow those sences And this obedience is required to be yielded to this Prophet only universally and under great penalties It 's required to be given to him only for so Him in the Text must be understood as exclusive of all others It 's true we are commanded to obey the voice of his Ministers Heb. 13.17 But still it 's Christ speaking by them to whom we pay our obedience He that heareth you heareth me We obey them in the Lord i. e. commanding or forbidding in Christs name and authority So when God said Deut. 6.13 thou shalt serve Him Christ expounds it exclusively Matth. 4.10 Him only shalt thou serve He is the only Lord Jude 4. And therefore to him only our obedience is required And as it 's due to him only so to him universally Him shall ye hear in all things His commands are to be obeyed not disputed A Judgement of discretion indeed is allowed to Christians to Judge whether it be the will of Christ or no. We must prove what is that holy good and acceptable will Rom. 12.2 His Sheep hear his voice and a stranger they will not follow They know his voice but know not the voice of strangers Joh. 10.4 5. But when his will is understood and known we have no liberty of Choice but are concluded by it be the Duty commanded never so difficult or the sin forbidden never so tempting And this is also required severely under penalty of being destroyed from among the people And of Gods requiring it at our hands as it is in Deut. 18. i. e. of revenging himself in the destruction of the disobedient Hence the observation is DOCT. That Iesus Christ is called and appointed by God to be the great Prophet and teacher of the Church He is anointed to Preach good tidings to the meek and sent to bind up the broken hearted Isa. 61.1 When he came to Preach the Gospel among the people then was this Scripture fulfilled Matth. 11.27 Yea all things are delivered him of his Father so as no man knoweth who the Father is but the Son and be to whom the Son will reveal him All light is now collected into one body of light the Sun of righteousness and he enlighteneth every man that cometh into the world Joh. 1.9 And though he dispenseth knowledge variously in times past speaking in many ways and divers manners to the Fathers yet now the Method and way of revealing the will of God to us is fixt and setled in Christ. In these last times he hath spoken to us by his Son Twice hath the Lord solemnly sealed him to this Office or approved and owned him in it by a miraculous voice from the most excellent glory Matth. 3. ult and Matth. 17.5 In this point there are two things doctrinally to be discussed and opened viz. What Christs being a Prophet to the Church implies And how he executes and discharges this his Office First What is implyed in Christs being a Prophet to the Church And it necessarily imports these three things First The natural ignorance and blindness of men in the things of God This shewes us that vain man is born as the wild Asses Colt The world is involved in darkness The people sit as in the Region and shadow of Death till Christ arise upon their Souls Matth. 4.15 16 17. 'T is true in the state of innocence man had a clear apprehension of the will of God without a Mediator but now that light is quencht in the corruption of nature and the natural man receiveth not the things of God 1 Cor. 2.14 These things of God are not only contrary to corrupt carnal reason but they are also above right reason Grace indeed useth nature but nature can do nothing without grace The mind of a natural man hath not only a native blindness by reason whereof it cannot discern the things of the Spirit but also a natural enmity Rom. 8.7 And hates the light 1 Ioh. 3.19 20. So that untill the mind be healed and enlightened by Jesus Christ the natural faculty can no more discern the things of the spirit than the sensitive faculty can discern the things of reason The mysteries of nature may be discovered by the light of nature but when it comes to the Supernatural mysteries there omnis platonicorum caligavit subtilitas as Cyprian some where speaks the most subtile searching penetrating wit and reason is stalled and at a loss Secondly It implys the divinity of Christ. And proves him to be true God for as much as no other can reveal to the world in all ages the secrets that lay hid in the heart of God and that with such convincing evidence and authority He brought his Doctrine from the bosom of his Father Ioh. 1.18 The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father him hath he revealed The same words which his Father gave him he hath given us Ioh. 17.8 He spake to us that which he had seen with his Father Ioh. 8.38 What man can tell the bosom counsels and secrets of God Who but he that eternally lay in that bosom can expound them Besides Other Prophets had their times assigned them to rise shine and set again by Death Zâ—ch 1.5 Your Fathers where are they And do the Prophets live for ever But Christ is a fixed and perpetual Sun that gives light in all ages of the world For he is the same yesterday to day and for ever Heb. 13.8 Yea and the very beams of his divinity shone with awefulness upon the hearts of them that
can command or open the heart We may stand and knock at mens hearts till our own ake but no opening till Christ come He can fit a key to all the cross wards of the will and with sweet efficacy open it and that without any force or violence to it These things are carried in this part of his office Consisting in opening the heart Which was the first thing propounded for explication Secondly In the next place let us see by what acts Jesus Christ performs this work of his and what way and method he takes to open the heart of Sinners And there are two principal ways by which Christ opens the understandings and hearts of men viz. By His word And spirit First by his word to this end was Paul commissionated and sent to preach the Gospel Act. 26.18 To open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God The Lord can if he pleases accomplish this immediately but though he can do it he will not do it ordinarily without means because he will honour his own institutions Therefore you shall observe that when Lydia's heart was to be opened there appeared unto Paul a man of Macedonia who prayed him saying come over into Macedonia and help us Act. 19.9 God will keep up the reputation of his ordinances among men And though he hath not tyed himself yet he hath tyed us to them Cornelius must send for Peter God can make the earth produce corn as it did at first without cultivation and labour but he that shall now expect it in the neglect of means may perish for want of bread Secondly But the ordinances in themselves cannot do it as I noted before and therefore Jesus Christ hath sent forth the Spirit who is his Pro Rex his vicegerent to carry on this work upon the hearts of his Elect. And when the Spirit comes down upon Souls in the administration of the ordinances he effectually opens the heart to receive the Lord Jesus by the hearing of faith He breaks in upon the understanding and conscience by powerful convictions and compunctions so much that word Iohn 16.8 imports he shall convince the world of Sin Convince by clear demonstration such as inforces assent so that the Soul can not but yeeld it to be so And yet the door of the heart is not opened till he have also put forth his power upon the will and by a sweet and secret efficacy overcome all it's reluctations and the Soul be made willing in the day of his power When this is done the heart is opened Saving light now shines in it and this light set up by the Spirit in the Soul is First a new light in which all things appear far otherwise than they did before The name of Christ and Sin the word Heaven and Hell have an other sound in that mans ears than formerly they had When he comes to read the same Scriptures which possibly he had read an hundred times before he wonders he should be so blind as he was to over look such great weighty and concerning things as he now beholds in them and saith where were mine eyes that I could never see these things before Secondly It is a very affecting light A light that hath heat and powerful influences in it which makes deep impressions on the heart Hence they whose eyes the great Prophet opens are said to be brought out of darkness into his marvelous light 1 Pet. 2.9 The Soul is greatly affected with what it sees The beams of light are contracted and twisted together in the mind and being reflected on the heart and affections soon cause them to smoak and burn Did not our hearts burn within us whilst he talked with us and opened to us the Scriptures Thirdly And it is a growing light Like the light of the morning which shines more and more unto a perfect Day Prov. 4.18 When the Spirit first opens the understanding he doth not give it at once a full sight of all truths or a full sence of the power sweetness and goodness of any truth but the Soul in the use of means grows up to a greater clearness day by day It 's knowledge grows extensively in measure and intensively in power and efficacy And thus the Lord Jesus by his Spirit opens the understanding Now the use of this follows in 5. practical deductions Inference 1. If this be the work and office of Jesus Christ to open the understandings of men Hence we infer the misery that lyes upon those men whose understandings to this day Iesus Christ hath not opened Of whom we may say as it is Deut. 29.4 To this day Christ hath not given them eyes to see Natural blindness whereby we are deprived of the light of this world is sad but spiritual blindness is much more sad See how dolefully their case is represented 2 Cor. 4.3 4. But if our Gospel be hid it is hid to them that are lost whose eyes the God of this world hath blinded lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ who is the image of God should shine unto them He means a total and final concealment of the saving power of the word from them Why what if Jesus Christ withhold it and will not be a Prophet to them what is their condition truly no better than lost men It is hid 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to them that are to perish or be destroyed This blindness like the covering of the face or tying the handkerchief over the eyes is in order to their turning off into Hell More particularly because the point is of deep concernment let us consider First the Iudgement inflicted and that 's spiritual blindness A sore misery indeed Not anuniversal ignorance of all truths O no in natural and moral truths they are often times acute and sharpe sighted men but in that part of knowledge which wrape up eternal life Iohn 17.2 there they are utterly blinded As it 's said of the Iews upon whom this misery lies that blindness in part is happened to Israel They are learned and knowing persons in other matters but they know not Jesus Christ there is the grand and sad defect Secondly the subject of this Judgement the mind which is the eye of the soul. If it were but upon the body it would not be so considerable this falls immediately upon the soul the noblest part of man and upon the mind the highest and noblest faculty of the soul whereby we understand think and reason This in Scripture is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the spirit The intellectual rational faculty which Philosophers call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the leading directive faculty which is to the soul what the natural eye 〈◊〉 to the body Now the soul being the most active and restless thing in the world always working and its leading directive power blind Judge what a sad and dangerous state such a soul is in Just like a fiery high metled
a memorable passage that fell out in their way to the place of execution and that is the Lamentations and Wailings of some that followed him out of the City who expressed their pity and sorrow for him most tenderly and compassionately All hearts were not hard all eyes were not dry There followed him a great company of people and of women which also bewailed and lamented him c. In this Paragraph we have two parts viz. the Lamentation of the Daughters of Ierusalem for Christ and Christs reply to them First The Lamentation of the Daughters of Ierusalem for Christ. Concerning them we briefly enquire who they were and why they mourned First Who they were The text calls them Daughters i. e. Inhabitants of Ierusalem For it is an Hebraism as Daughters of Zion Daughters of Israel And it 's like the greatest part of them were women and they were many of them a troop of mourners that followed Christ out of the City towards the place of his execution with Lamentations and Wailings What the principle and ground of these their Lamentations was is not agreed upon by those that have pondred the story Some are of opinion their Tears and Lamentations were but the effects and fruits of their more tender and ingenious natures which were moved and melted with so tragical and sad a spectacle as was now before them It 's well observed by a judicious Author that the Tragical story of some great and noble personage full of hero'cal vertue and ingenuity yet inhumanely and ungratefully used will thus work upon ingenious spirits who read or hear of it which when it reaches no higher is so far from being faith that it is but a carnal and fleshly devotion springing from fancy which is pleased with such a story and the principles of ingenuity stirred towards one who is of a Noble Spirit and yet abused Such stories use to stir up a principle of humanity in men unto a compassionate love which Christ himself at his suffering found fault with as being not spiritual nor raised enough in those women that went weeping to see the Messiah so handled Weep not for me saith he that is weep not so much for this to see me so unworthily handled by those for whom I die This is the principle from which some conceive these tears to flow But Calvin attributes it to their faith looking upon these mourners as a remnant reserved by the Lord in that miserable dispersion and though their faith was but weak yet they judge it credible that there was a secret seed of godliness in them which afterwards grew to maturity and brought forth fruit And to the same sence others give their opinion also Secondly Let us consider Christs reply to them Weep not for me ye Daughters of Jerusalem c. Strange that Christ should forbid them to weep for him yea for him under such unparalell'd sufferings and miseries If ever there was a heart-melting object in the world it was here O who could hold whose heart was not petrified and more obdure than the senseless rocks This reply therefore of Christ undergoes a double sence and interpretation suitable to the different construction of their sorrows Those that look upon their sorrows as meerly natural take Christs reply in a negative sense prohibiting such tears as those They that expound their sorrows as the fruit of faith tell us though the form of Christs expression be negative yet the sense is comparative as Matth. 9.13 I will have mercy and not sacrifice i. e. mercy rather than sacrifice So here weep rather upon your own account than mine Reserve your sorrows for the calamities coming upon your selves and your children You are greatly affected I see with the misery that is upon me but mine will be quickly over yours will lie long In which he shews his merciful and compassionate disposition who was still more mindful of others troubles and burdens than of his own And indeed the days of calamity coming upon them and their children were doleful days What direful and unpresidented miseries befel them at the breaking up and devastation of the City who hath not read or heard And who can refrain from tears that hears or reads it Now if we take the words in the first sense as a prohibition of their meerly natural and carnal affections expressed in Tears and Lamentations for him no otherwise than they would have been upon any other like Tragical story then the observation from it will be this Doct. 1. That melting affections and sorrows even from the sense and consideration of the sufferings of Christ are no infallible signs of grace If you take it in the latter sense as the fruit of their faith as tears flowing from a gratious principle then the observation will be this Doct. 2. That the believing meditation of what Christ suffered for us is of great force and efficacy to melt and break the heart I shall rather choose to prosecute both these branches than to decide the controversie Especially since the notes gathered from either are so useful to us And therefore I shall begin with the first viz. DOCT. 1. That melting affections and sorrows even from the sence of Christs sufferings are no infallible marks of grace In this point I have two things to do to prepare it for use First To shew what the melting of the affections by way of grief and sorrow is Secondly That they may be so melted even upon the account of Christ and yet the heart remain unrenewed First What the melting of the affections by way of grief and sorrow is Tears are nothing else but the juice of a mind oppressed and squeesed with grief Grief compresses the heart the heart so compressed and squeez'd vents it self sometimes in tears sighs groans c. and this is two fold gratious and wholly supernatural or common and altogether natural The gratious melting or sorrow of the soul is likewise two fold habitual or actual Habitual godly sorrow is that gratious disposition inclination or tendency of the renewed heart to mourn and melt when any just occasion is presented to the soul that calls for such sorrow It is expressed Ezek. 36.26 By taking away the heart of stone and giving an heart of flesh That is an heart impressive and yielding to such arguments and considerations as move it to mourning Actual sorrow is the expression and manifestation of that its inclination upon just occasions and it 's expressed two ways either by the internal effects of it which are the heaviness shame loathing resolution and holy revenge begotten in the soul upon the account of sin or also by more external and visible effects as sighs groans tears c. The former is essential to godly sorrow the latter contingent and accidental Much depending upon the natural temperature and constitution of the body Natural and common meltings are nothing else but the effects of a better temper the fruit of a more ingenious
Christs death was Justice and Mercy In respect of man it was murder and cruelty In respect of himself it was obedience and humility Hence our note is DOCT. That our Lord Iesus Christ was not only put to death but to the worst of deaths even the death of the Cross. To this the Apostle gives a plain testimony Phil. 2.8 He became obedient to death even the death of the Cross where his humiliation is both specified he was humbled to death and aggravated by a most emphatical reduplication even the death of the Cross. So Act. 5.30 Iesus whom ye slew and hanged upon a tree q. d. it did not suffice you to put him to a violent but you also put him to the most base vile and ignominious death you hanged him on a tree In this point we will discuss these three particulars viz. the nature or kind the manner and reasons of Christs death upon the tree First I shall open the kind or nature of this death by shewing you that it was a violent painful shameful cursed slow and succourless death First It was a violent death that Christ died Violent in it self though voluntary on his part He was cut off out of the land of the living Isai. 53.8 And yet he laid down his life of himself no man took it from him Joh. 10.17 I call his death violent because he died not a natural death i. e. he lived not till nature was consumed with age as it is in many who live till their balsamum radicale radical moisture like the oyl in the Lamp be quite consumed and then go out like an expiring Lamp It was not so with Christ. For he was but in the very flower and prime of his time when he died And indeed he must either die a violent death or not die at all partly because there was no sin in him to open a door to natural death as it doth in all others Partly because else his death had not been a sacrifice acceptable and satisfactory to God for us That which died of it self was never offered up to God but that which was slain when it was in its full strength and health The Temple was a Type of the body of Christ. Now when the Temple was destroyed it did not drop down as an antient structure decayed by time but was pulled down by violence when it was standing in its full strength Therefore he is said to suffer death and to be put to death for us in the flesh 1 Pet. 3.18 That 's the first thing It was a violent though a voluntary death For violent is not opposed to voluntary but to natural Secondly The death of the Cross was a most painful death Indeed in this death were many deaths contrived in one The Cross was a Rack as well as a Gibber The pains Christ suffered upon the Cross are by the Apostle emphatically stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 2.24 the pains of death but properly they signifie the pangs of travail yea the birth pangs the most acute sorrows of a travailing woman His soul was in travail Isai. 53. His body in bitter pangs and being as Aquinas speaks optime complectionatus of the most excellent Crisis exact and just temperament his sences were more acute and delicate than ordinary and all the time of his suffering so they continued not in the least blunted dulled or rebated by the pains he suffered The death of Christ doubtless contained the greatest and acutest pains imaginable Because these pains of Christ alone were intended to equalize all that misery which the sin of man deserved all that pain which the damned shall and the Elect deserved to feel Now to have pains meeting at once upon one person equivalent to all the pains of the damned Judge you what a plight Christ was in Thirdly The death of the Cross was a shameful death Not only because the crucified were stripped quite naked and so exposed as spectacles of shame but mainly because it was that kind of death which was appointed for the basest and vilest of men Their Free-men when they committed capital crimes were not condemned to the Cross. No that was looked upon as the death appointed for slaves Tacitus calls it servile supplicium the punishment of a slave and to the same sense Iuvenal speaks pone crucem servo put the Cross upon the back of a slave As they had a great esteem of a Free-man so they manifested it even when they had forfeited their lives in cutting them off by more honourable kinds of death This by hanging on the tree was alwaies accounted most ignominious To this day we say of him that 's hanged he dies the death of a dog And yet it 's said of our Lord Jesus Heb. 12.2 he not only endured the Cross but also despised the shame Obedience to his Fathers will and zeal for your Salvation made him digest the shame of it and despise the baseness that was in it Fourthly The death of the Cross was a cursed death Upon that account he is said to be made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a curse for us for it is written cursed is every one that hangeth on a Tree Gal. 3.13 This refers to Deut. 21.23 His body shall not remain all night upon the Tree but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day for he that is hanged is accursed of God The very Symbol of lifting them up betwixt heaven and earth carryed much shame in it For it implied this in it that the person so used was so execrable base and vile that he deserved not to tread upon the earth or touch the surface of the ground any more And the command for burying them that day doth not at all mitigate but rather aggravates this curse speaking the person to be so abominable that as he is lifted up into the air and hanging between heaven and earth as unworthy ever to set foot more upon the earth so when dead they were to hasten to bury him that such an abominable sight might be removed assoon as might be from before the eyes of men And that the earth might not be defiled by his lying on the surface of it when taken down However as the Learned Iunius hath Judiciously observed that this curse is only a Ceremonial curse For otherwise it 's neither in it self nor by the Law of nature or by civil Law more execrable than any other death And the main reason why the Ceremonial Law affixed the curse to this rather than any other death was principally with respect to the death Christ was to die And therefore Reader see and admire the providence of God that Christ should die by a Roman and not by a Iudaick Law For Crucifying or Hanging on the Tree was a Roman punishment and not in use among the Jews But the Scriptures cannot be broken Fifthly The death of the Cross was a very slow and lingering death They died leisurably
in Hell for ever Rom. 2.5 6 7 8 9 10. Thou treasurest up to thy self wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous Iudgement of God Who shall render to every man according to his deeds To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality eternal life but unto them that are contentious and obey not the truth but obey unrighteousness indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doth evil c. So 2 Thes. 1.4 5 6 7. So that we our selves glory in you in the Churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure Which is a manifest token of the righteous Iudgement of God That ye may be counted worthy of the Kingdom of God for which ye also suffer Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompence tribulation to them that trouble you and to you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Iesus shall be revealed from Heaven in flaming fire c. To these plain testimonies multitudes more might be added if it were needful Heaven and Earth shall pass away but these words shall never pass away Arg. 3. Thirdly As the Scriptures reveal it so the Consciences of all men have some resentments of it Where is the man whose Conscience never felt any impressions of hope or fear from a future world If it be said these may be but the effects and force of discourse or education we have read such things in the Scriptures or have heard it by Preachers and so raise up to our selves hopes and fears about it I demand how the Consciences of the Heathens who have neither Scriptures nor Preachers came to be imprest with these things Doth not the Apostle tells us Rom. 2.15 That their Consciences in the mean while work upon these things Their thoughts with reference to a future state accuse or else excuse i. e. their hearts are cheared and encouraged by the good they do and terrified with fears about the evils they commit Whereas if there were no such things Conscience would neither accuse or excuse for good or evil done in this world Arg. 4. Fourthly The incarnation and death of Christ is but a vanity without it What did he propose to himself or what benefit have we by his coming if there be no such future state Did he take our nature and suffer such terrible things in it for nothing If you say Christians have much comfort from it in this Life I answer the comforts they have are raised by faith and expectation of the happiness to be enjoyed as the purchase of his blood in Heaven And if there be no such heaven to which they are appointed No Hell from which they are redeemed they do but comfort themselves with a Fable and bless themselves in a thing of nought Their comfort is no greater than the comfort of a Beggar that dreams he is a King and when he awakes finds himself a Beggar still Surely the ends of Christs death were to deliver us from the wrath to come 1 Thes. 1.10 Not from an imaginary but a real Hell to bring us to God 1 Pet. 3.18 To be the Author of eternal Salvation to them that obey him Heb. 5.9 Arg. 5. Fifthly and lastly The immortality of humane souls puts it beyond all doubt The soul of a man vastly differs from that of a Beast which is but a material form and so wholly depending on must needs perish with the matter But it is not so with us Ours are reasonable spirits that can live and act in a separated state from the body Eccles. 3.21 Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward and the spirit of a Beast that goeth downward to the earth So that look as if a man dispute whether man be rational that his very disputing it proves him to be so so our disputes hopes fears and apprehensions of eternity prove our souls immortal and capable of that state Inference 1. Is there an Eternal State into which souls pass after this Life How pretious then is present time upon the improvement whereof that State depends O what a huge weight hath God hanged upon a small wyer God hath set us here in a State of Tryal according as we improve these few hours so will it fare with us to all Eternity Every day every hour nay every moment of your present time hath an influence into your Eternity Do ye believe this What and yet squander away pretious time so carelesly so vainly How do these things consist When Seneca heard one promise to spend a week with a friend that invited him to recreate himself with him He told him he admired he should make such a rash promise what said he cast away so considerable a part of your Life How can you do it Surely our prodigallity in the expence of time argues we have but little sence of great Eternity Inference 2. How rational are all the difficulties and severities of Religion which serve to promote and secure a future Eternal Happiness So vast is the disproportion betwixt Time and Eternity things seen and not seen as yet the present vanishing and future permanent state that he can never be justly reputed a wise man that will not let go the best enjoyment he hath on earth if it stand in the way of his eternal happiness Nor can that man ever escape the just censure of notorious folly who for the gratifying of his appetite and present accommodation of his flesh le ts go an eternal glory in heaven Darius repented heartily that he lost a Kingdom for a draught of water O said he for how short a pleasure have I sold a Kingdom It was Moses choice and his choice argued his wisdom he chose rather to suffer afflictions with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin which are but for a season Heb. 11.25 Men do not account him a fool that will adventure a Penny upon a probability to gain ten thousand pounds But sure the disproportion betwixt Time and Eternity is much greater Inference 3. If there certainly be such an Eternal State into which souls pass immediately after Death How great a change then doth Death make upon every man and woman O what a serious thing is it to die It 's your passage out of the swift river of Time into the boundless and bottomless Ocean of Eternity You that now converse with sensible objects with men and women like your selves enter then into the world of Spirits You that now see the continual revolutions of daies and nights passing away one after another will then be fixed in a perpetual NOW O what a serious thing is Death You throw a cast for Eternity when you die If you were to cast a Dye for your natural life oh how would your hand shake with fear how it would fall but what is that to this The souls of
part And his bearing it was no small part of the reparation or satisfaction he made for our sins More particularly to open the nature of this desertion of Christ by his Father there being much of intricacy and difficulty in it I shall proceed in the explication of it Negatively and Positively First Negatively when Christ cries out of Gods forsaking him he doth not mean that he had dissolved the personal union of the two natures Not as if the marriage knot which united our nature to the person of Christ was loosed or a divorce made betwixt them No for when he was forsaken of God he was still true and real Godman in one person Secondly When Christ bewails the Fathers forsaking him he doth not mean that he pulled away the prop of divine support from him by which he had till then endured the tortures and sufferings that oppressed him No though the Father deserted yet he still supported him And so much is intimated in these words of Christ Eli Eli which signifies my strong one my strong one God was with him by way of support when withdrawn as to manifestations of love and favour In respect of Gods supporting presence which was with Christ at this time it 's said Isai. 42.1 Behold my Servant whom I uphold and Joh. 16.32 I am not alone but the Father is with me So that this cannot be the meaning of it Thirdly Much less is it his meaning that God had left him as to inherent grace and sanctification Recalling that spirit of holiness which had anointed him above his fellows No no when he was forsaken he remained as holy as ever He had indeed less comfort but not less holiness than before Such a desertion had irritated and made void the very end of his death And his sacrifice could never have yielded such a fragrant odor to God as it did Eph. 5.2 Fourthly The love of God was not so withdrawn from Christ as that the Father had now no love for him nor delight in him That 's impossible he can no more cease to love Christ than to love himself His love was not turned into wrath Though his wrath only was now manifested to him as our surety and his love hid from him as his beloved Son Fifthly Nor was Christ forsaken by his Father finally upon what account soever it was that he was forsaken No it was but for a few hours that the dark cloud dwelt over his soul. It soon past away And the bright and glorious face of God shone forth again as bright as ever Psal. 22.1.24 compared Sixthly And lastly It was not a mutual desertion or a desertion on both parts the Father forsook him but he forsook not his Father When God withdrew he followed him crying my God my God Yet to speak positively of it though it did not dissolve the personal union nor cutting off divine supports nor remove his inherent grace nor turn his Fathers love into hatred nor continue for ever nor yet was it on both parts Christs forsaking God as well as God forsaking Christ yet I say it was First A very sad desertion the like unto which in all respects never was experienced by any nor can be to the end of the world All his other troubles were but small things to this they bare upon his body these upon his soul. They came from the hands of vile men this from the hand of a dear Father He suffered both in body and soul but the sufferings of his soul were the very soul of his sufferings Under all his other sufferings he opened not his mouth but this toucht the quick that he could not but cry out my God my God why hast thou forsaken me Secondly As it was a sad so it was a poenal desertion inflicted on him for satisfaction for those sins of ours which deserved that God should forsake us for ever as the damned are forsaken by him So that this cry as one observes was like the perpetual shriek of them that are cast away for ever This was that Hell and the torments of it which Christ our surety suffered for us For look as there lies a twofold misery upon the damned in Hell viz. pain of sence and pain of loss So upon Christ answerably there was not only an impression of wrath but also a Substraction or withdrawment of all sensible favour and love Hence it 's said by himself Ioh. 12.27 And now my soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is troubled The word signifies troubled as they that are in Hell are troubled Though God did not leave his soul in Hell as others are he having enough to pay the debt which they have not yet in the torments thereof at this time he was Yea in sufferings at this time in his soul equivalent to all that which our souls should have suffered there to all Eternity Thirdly It was a desertion that was real and not fictitious He doth not personate a deserted soul and speak as if God had withdrawn the comfortable sence and influence of his love from him but the thing was so indeed The God-head restrained and kept back for this time all its joys comforts and sence of love from the man-hood yielding it nothing but support This bitter doleful out-cry of Christ gives evidence enough of the reality of it He did not feign but feel the burdensomness of it Fourthly This desertion fell out in the time of Christs greatest need of comfort that ever he had in all the time of his life on earth His Father forsook him at that time when all earthly comforts had forsaken him and all outward evils had broken in together upon him When men yea the best of men stood afar off and none but barbarous enemies were about him When pains and shame and all miseries even weighed him down then even then to compleat and fill up his sufferings God stands afar off too Fifthly And lastly It was such a desertion as left him only to the supports of his Faith He had nothing else now but his Fathers covenant and promise to hang upon And indeed as a Juditious Author perninently observes the Faith of Christ did several ways act and manifest it self in these very words of complaint in the Text. For though all comfortable sights of God and sence of love were obstructed yet you see his soul cleaves fiducially to God for all that My God c. Though sense and feeling spake as well as Faith Yet Faith speaks first my God before sence speaks a word of his forsaking His Faith prevented the complaint of sence and though sence comes in afterward with a word of complaint yet here are two words of Faith to one of Sence It is my God my God and but one word of forsaking As his Faith spake first so it spake twice when sence and feeling spake but once Yea and as Faith spake first and twice as much as sence so it spake more confidently than Sence did He lays a
Her beloved had withdrawn himself and was gone but was she content to part with him so No such thing By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loveth I sought him but I found him not I will arise now and go about the City c. Thirdly Though God forsook Christ yet he returned to him again It was but for a time not for ever In this also doth his desertion parallel yours God may for several wise and holy reasons hide his face from you but not so as it 's hid from the damned who shall never see it again This cloud will pass away This night shall have a bright morning For saith thy God I will not contend for ever neither will I be always wroth for the spirit should fail before me and the souls which I have made As if he should say I may contend with him for a time to humble him but not for ever left instead of a sad child I should have a dead child Oh the tenderness even of a displeased Father Fourthly Though God forsook Christ yet at that time he could justifie God So you read Psal. 22.2 3. O my God saith he I cry in the day time but thou hearest not and in the night season and am not silent but thou art holy Is not thy spirit according to thy measure framed like Christs in this Canst thou not say even when he writes bitter things against thee he is a holy faithful and good God for all this I am deserted but not wronged There is not one drop of injustice in all the Sea of my sorrows Though he condemn me I must and will Justifie him This also is Christ-like Fifthly Though God took from Christ all visible and sensible comforts inward as well as outward yet Christ subsisted by faith in the absence of them all His desertion put him upon the acting of his faith My God my God are words of faith The words of one that rolls upon his God And is it not so with you too Sence of love is gone sweet sights of God shut up in a dark cloud well what then Must thy hands presently hang down and thy soul give up all its hopes What! is there no faith to relieve in this case Yes yes and blessed be God for faith Who is among you that feareth the Lord and obeyeth the voice of his servants that walketh in darkness and hath no light let him trust in the name of the Lord and stay himself upon his God Isai. 50.10 To conclude Sixthly Christ was deserted a little before the glorious morning of light and joy dawned upon him It was a little a very little while after this sad cry before he triumphed gloriously And so it may be with you Heaviness may endure for a night but joy and gladness will come in the morning You know how Mr. Glover was trasported with joy and cryed out as a man in a Rapture O Austin he is come he is come he is come meaning the Comforter who for some time had been absent from his soul. But I fear I am absolutely and finally forsaken Why so Do you find the characters of such a desertion upon your soul Be righteous Judges and tell me whether you find an heart willing to forsake God Is it indifferent now to you whether God ever return again or no Are there no mournings meltings hankerings after the Lord Indeed if you forsake him he will cast you off for ever But can you do so Oh no let him do what he will I am resolved to wait for him cleave to him mourn after him though I have no present comfort from him no assurance of my interest in him yet will I not exchange my poor weak hopes for all the good in this world Again You say God hath forsaken you but hath he let loose the bridle before you To allude to Iob. 30.11 Hath he taken away from your souls all conscientious tenderness of sin so that now you can sin freely and without any regret If so it 's a sad token indeed Tell me soul if thou judgest indeed God will never return in loving kindness to thee any more why dost thou not then give thy self over to the pleasures of sin and fetch thy comforts that way from the creatures since thou canst have no comfort from thy God Oh no I cannot do so If I die in darkness and sorrow I will never do so My soul is as full of fear and hatred of sin as ever though empty of joy and comfort Surely there are no tokens of a soul finally abandoned by its God Inference 4. Did God forsake his own Son upon the Cross then the dearest of Gods people may for a time be forsaken of their God Think it not strange when you that are the children of light meet with darkness yea and walk it â— Neither charge God foolishly Say not he deals hardly with you You see what befel Jesus Christ whom his soul delighted in It 's doubtless your concernment to expect and prepare for days of darkness You have heard the doleful cry of Christ my God my God why hast thou forsaken me You know how it was with Job David Hâ—man Asaph and many others the dear servants of God What heart-melting lamentations they have made upon this account And are you better than they Oh prepare for spiritual troubles I am sure you do enough every day to involve you in darkness Now if at any time this trial befall you mind these two seasonable Admonitions and lay them up for such a time Admonition 1. First Exercise the faith of adherence when you have lost the faith of evidence When God takes away that he leaves this That is necessary to the comfort this to the life of his people It 's sweet to live in views of your interest but if they be gone believe and roll on God for an interest Stay your selves on your God when you hâ—ve no light Isai. 50.10 Drop this anchor in the dark and do not reckon all gone when evidence is gone Never reckon your selves undone whilst you can adhere to your God Direct acts are noble acts of faith as well as reflexive ones Yea and in some respects to be preferred to them For First As your comfort depends on the evidencing acts of faith so your salvation upon the adhering act of faith Evidence comforts but affiance saves you And sure salvation is more than comfort Secondly Your faith of evidence hath more sensible sweetness but your faith of adherence is of more constancy and continuance The former is as a flower in its mouth the latter sticks by you all the year Thirdly Faith of evidence brings more joy to you but faith of adherence brings more glory to God For thereby you trust him when you cannot see him Yea you beleive not only without but against sence and feeling And doubtless that which brings glory to God is better than that which brings comfort to you
large a capacity to take in the full sence of the wrath of God as Christ had The larger any ones capacity is to understand and weigh his troubles fully the more grievous and heavy is his burden If a man cast vessels of greater and lesser quantity into the Sea though all will be full yet the greater the vessel is the more water it contains Now Christ had a capacity beyond all meer creatures to take in the wrath of his Father And what deep and large apprehensions â—e had of it may be judged by the bloody sweat in the garden which was the effect of his meer apprehensions of the wrath of God Christ was a large vessel indeed As he is capable of more glory so of more sence and misery than any other person in the world Thirdly The damned suffer not so innocently as Christ suffered they suffer the just demerit and recompence of their sin They have deserved all that wrath of God which they feel and must feel for ever It is but that recompence which was meet But Christ was altogether innocent He had done no iniquity neither was guile found in his mouth yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him When Christ suffered he suffered not for what we had done but his sufferings were the sufferings of a surety paying the debts of others The Messiah was cut off but not for himself Dan. 9.26 Thus you see what his external sufferings in his body and his internal sufferings in his soul were Thirdly In the last place it is evident that such extream sufferings as these meeting together upon him must needs exhaust his very spirits and make make him cry I thirst For let us consider First What meer external pains and outward afflictions can do These prey upon and consume our spirits So David complains Psal. 39.11 When thou with rebukes correctest man for iniquity thou makest his beauty to consume away as a Moth i. e. look as a Moth frets and consumes the most strong and well wrought garment and makes it seary and rotten without any noise so afflictions wast and wear out the strongest bodies They make bodies of the firmest constitution like an old rotten garment They shrivel and dry up the most vigorous and flourishing body and make it like a bottle in the smoke Psal. 119.83 Secondly Consider what meer internal troubles of the soul can do upon the stongest body These quickly spend it's strength and devour the Spirits So Solomon speaks Prov. 17.22 A broken Spirit drieth the bones i. e. it consumes the very marrow with which they are moistned So Psal. 32.3 4. My bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long For day and night thy hand was heavy on me my moisture or chief sap is turned into the drought of Summer What a spectacle of pity was Francis Spira become meerly through the anguish of his spirit A spirit sharpned with such troubles like a keen knife cuts through the sheath Certainly who ever hath had any acquaintance with troubles of soul knows by sad experience how like an internal flame it feeds and preys upon the very spirits so that the strongest stoop and quail under it But Thirdly When outward bodily pains shall meet with inward spiritual troubles and both in extremity shall come in one day how soon must the firmest body fail and wast away like a candle lighted at both ends Now strengâ—h fails a pace and nature must fall flat under this load When the Ship in which Paul sailed fell into a place where two Seas met it was quickly wrackt and so will the best constituted body in the world if it fall under both these troubles together The soul and body sympathize with each other under trouble and muâ—ually relieve each oâ—her If the body be sick and â—ull of pain the spirit supports chears and relieves it by reason and resolution all that it can And if the spirit be afflicted the body sympathizes and helps to bear up the spirit But now if the one be over-laid with strong pains more than it can bear and calls for aid from the other and the other be oppressed with intolerable anguish and cries out under a burden greater than it can bear so that it can contribute no help but instead thereof adds to its burden which before was above strength to bear Now nature must needs fail and the friendly union betwixt soul and body suffer a dissolution by such an overwhelming pressure as this So it was with Christ when outward and inward sorrows met in one day in their extremity upon him Hence the bitter cry I thirst Inference 1. How horrid a thing is Sin How great is that evil of evils Which deserves that all this should be inflicted and suffered for the expiation of it The sufferings of Christ for sin gives us the true account and fullest representation of its evil The Law saith one is a bright glass wherein we may see the evil of sin but there is the Red glass of the sufferings of Christ and in that we may see more of the evâ—l of sin than if God should let us down to Hell and there we should see all the tortures and torments of the damned If we should see them how they lie sweltering under Gods wrath there it were not so much as the beholding of sin through this Red glass of the sufferings of Christ. Suppose the bars of the bottomless pit were broken up and damned spirits should ascend from thence and come up among us with the chains of darkness rattling at their heels and we should hear the groans and see the gastly paleness and tremblings of those poor creatures upon whom the righteous God hath imprest his fury and indignation if we could hear how their consciences are lashed by the fearful scourge of guilt and how they shriek at every lash the arm of Justice gives them If we should see and hear all this it is not so much as what we may see in this Text where the Son of God under his sufferings for it crys out I thirst For as I shewed you before Christs sufferings in divers respects were beyond theirs O then let not thy vain heart slight sin as if it were but a small thing If ever God shew thee the face of sin in this glass thou wilt say there is not such another horrid representation to be made to a man in all the world Fools make a mock of sin but wise men tremble at it Inference 2. How afflictive and intolerable are inward troubles Did Christ complain so sadly under them and cry I thirst Surely then they are no such light matters as many are apt to make of them If they so scorcht the very heart of Christ dryed up the green tree preyed upon his very spirits and turned his moisture into the drought of Summer they deserve not to be sleighted as they are by some The Lord Jesus was fitted to bear and suffer as strong
thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled They shall then depend no more upon the stream but drink from the ever flowing fountain it self Psal 36.8 They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house and thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy pleasures For with thee is the fountain of life and in thy light shall we see light There they shall drink and praise and praise and drink for evermore All their thirsty desires shall be filled with compleat satisfaction O how desirable a state is heaven upon this account And how should we be restless till we come thither as the thirsty traveller is until he meet that cool refreshing spring he wants and seeks for This present state is a state of thirsting that to come of refreshment and satisfaction Some drops indeed come from that fountain by faith but they quench not the believers thirst Rather like water sprinkled on fire they make it burn the more but there the thirsty soul hath enough O bless God that Jesus Christ thirsted under the heat of his wrath once that you might not be scorched with it for ever If he had not cryed I thirst you must have cryed out of thirst eternally and never be satisfied Inference 6. Lastly Did Christ in the extremity of his sufferings cry I thirst Then how great beyond all compare is the love of God to Sinners Who for their sakes exposed the Son of his love to such extream sufferings Three considerations marvelously heighten that love of the Father First His putting the Lord Jesus into such a condition There is none of us would endure to see a Child of our own lie panting and thirsting in the extremity of torments for the fairest inheritance on earth Much less to have the soul of a child conflicting with the wrath of God and making such heart-rending complaints as Christ made upon the Cross if we might have the largest Empire in the world for it yet such was the strength of the love of God to us that he willingly gave Jesus Christ to all this misery and torture for us What shall we call this love O the height length depth and bredth of that love which passeth knowledge The love of God to Jesus Christ was infinitly beyond all the love we have to our children as the Sea is more than a spoonful of water and yet as dearly as he loved him he was content to expose him to all this rather than we should perish eternally Secondly As God the Father was content to expose Christ to this extremity so in that extremity to hear his bitter cries and dolorous complaints and yet not relieve him with the least refreshment till he fainted and died under it He heard the cries of his Son That voice I thirst pierced heaven and reacht the Fathers ear but yet he will not refresh him in his agonies nor abate him any thing of the debt he was now paying and all this for the love he had to poor sinners Had Christ been relieved in his sufferings and spared then God could not have pitied or spared us The extremity of Christs sufferings was an act of Justice to him and the greatest mercy to us that ever could be manifested Nor indeed though Christ so bitterly complains of his thirst was he willing to be relieved till he had finished his work O love unspeakable He doth not complain that he might be relieved but to manifest how great that sorrow was which his soul now felt upon our account Thirdly And it should never be forgotten that Jesus Christ was exposed to these extremities of sorrow for sinners the greatest of sinners who deserved not one drop of mercy from God This commends the love of God singularly to us in that whilst we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us Rom. 5.8 Thus the Love of God in Jesus Christ still rises higher and higher in every discovery of it Admire adore and be ravished with the thoughts of this Love Thanks be to God for his unspeakable Gift The THIRTY FIFTH SERMON JOH XIX XXX When Iesus therefore had received the Vinegar he said it is Finished and bowed his head and gave up the Ghost IT is finished This is the sixth remarkable word of our Lord Jesus Christ upon the Cross uttered as a Triumphant shout when he saw the glorious issue of all his sufferings now at hand It is but one word in the original but in that one word is contained the sum of all Joy The very spirits of all divine consolation The ancient Greeks reckoned it their excellency to speak much in a little To give a Sea of matter in a drop of language What they only sought is here found I find some variety and indeed variety rather than contrariety among expositors about the relation of these words Some are of opinion that the antecedent is the legal Types and Ceremonies And so make this to be the meaning It is finished that is all the Types and Prefigurations that shadowed forth the Redemption of souls by the blood of Christ are now fulfilled and accomplished And doubtless as this is in it self a truth so it 's such a truth as may not be excluded as alien to the true scope and sense of this place And though it be objected that many Types and Prefigurations remained at this time unsatisfied even all that looked to the actual death of Christ his continuance in the state of the dead and his resurrection yet it 's easily removed by considering that they are said to be finished because they were just finishing or ready to be finished And it is as if Christ had said I am now putting the last hand to it A few moments of time more will compleat and finish it I have the sum now in my hand which will fully satisfie and pay God the whole debt It is now but bow the head and the work is done and all the Types therein fulfilled So that this cannot exclude the fulfilling of the Types in the death of Christ from their just claim to the sense of this place But yet though we cannot here exclude this sense we cannot allow it to be the whole or principal sense For loe a far greater truth is contained herein even the finishing or complement of the whole design and project of our Redemption and therein of all the Types that prefigured it Both these judicious Calvin conjoyns making the compleating of redemption the principal and the fulfilling of all the Types the Collateral and less principal sense of it Yet it must be observed when we say Christ finished Redemption-work by his death the meaning is not that his death alone did finish it for his abode in the grave resurrection and ascention had all of them their joynt influence into it but these being shortly to follow are all included in the scope of this place According then to the principal scope of the place we observe DOCT.
freely with respect to her own delight and contentment in thaâ— work So it 's said of Christ and that by his own mouth Joh. 10.17 18. Therefore doth my Father love me because I lay down my life that I might take it again No man taketh it from me but I lay it down of my self I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it again this commandment have I received of my Father He liked the work for the ends sake When he had a prospect of it from eternity then were his delights with the Sons of men Then he rejoyced in the habitable parts of the earth Prov. 8.30 31. And when he came into the world about it with what a full and free consent did his heart eccho to the voice of his Father calling him to it Just as you shall sometimes hear an eccho answering your voice two or three times over Psal. 40. Lo I come I delight to do thy will thy Law is within my heart He finished the work freely Thirdly As he finished it freely so he finished it diligently He wrought hard from the morning of his life to the end of it he was never idle whereever he was but went about doing good Act. 10.38 Sometimes he was so intent upon his work that he forgat to eat bread Joh. 4.30 31. As the life of some men is but a diversion from one trifle to another from one pleasure to another so the whole life of Christ was spent and eaten up betwixt one work or another Never was a life so filled up with labour The very moments of his time were all imployed for God to finish this work Fourthly and Lastly he finished it compleatly and fully All that was to be done by way of impetration and meritorious redemption is fully done No hand can come after his Angels can add nothing to it That is perfected to which nothing is wanting and to which nothing can be added Such is the work Christ finished Whatever the Law demanded is perfectly paid Whatever a sinner needs is perfectly obtained and purchased Nothing can be added to what Christ hath done He put the last hand to it when he said it is finished Thus you see what the work was and how Christ finished it Thirdly In the Last place let us consider what assurance or evidence we have that Christ hath so finished redemption-work And if you pursue that enquiry you will find these among other plain evidences of it First When Christ died redemption-work must needs be finished in as much as the obedience and blood of Christ was of infinite value and efficacy sufficiently able to accomplish all the ends for which it was shed And that not by divine acceptation but upon the account of its proper value This effect viz. the finishing redemption-work meritoriously by Christ doth not exceed the power of the cause to which we assign it viz. the death of Christ. And if there be a sole sufficient cause in act what hinders but the effect should follow There was certainly enough in Christs blood to satisfie the uâ—most demand of Justice when that therefore is actually shed justice is fully paid and consequently the souls for whom and in whose names it 's paid fully redeemed from the curse by the merit thereof Secondly It 's apparent that Christ finished the work by the discharge or acquittance God the Father gave him when he raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand If Christ the sinners Surety be as such discharged by God the Creditor then the debt is fully paid Now Christ was justified and cleared at his resurrection from all charges and demands of Justice Therefore it 's saâ—d 1 Tim. 3.16 that he was Iustified in the spirit i. e. openly discharged by that very act of the Godhead his raising him from the dead For when the grave was opened and Christ rose it was to him as the opening of the Prison doors and setting a Surety at liberty who was clapt up for another mans debt To the same sense Christ speaks of his ascention Joh. 16.10 The spirit saith he shall convince the world of righteousness i. e. of a compleat and perfect righteousness in me imputable to sinners for their perfect Justification and whereby shall he convince and satisfie them that it is so why by this because I go to the Father and ye see me no more There 's a great deal of force and weight in those words because you see me no more For it amounts to this much by this you shall be satisfied I have fully and compleatly performed all Righteousness and that by my active and passive obedience I have so fully satisfied God for you as that you shall never be charged or condemned because when I go to Heaven I shall abide there in glory with my Father and not be sent back again as I should if any thing had been omitted by me And this the Apostle gives you also in so many plain words Heb. 10.12 13 14. After he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever sate down on the right hand of God And what doth he infer from that but the very truth before us vers 14. that by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified Thirdly It 's evident Christ hath finished the work by the blessed effects of it upon all that believe in him For by vertue of the compleatness of Christs work finished by his death their Consciences are now rationally pacified and their souls at death actually received into glory Neither of which could be if Christ had not in this world finished the work If Christ had done his work imperfectly he could not have given rest and tranquillity to the labouring and burdened souls that come to him as now he doth Matth. 11.28 Conscience would still be hesitating trembling and unsatisfied And had he not finished his work we could not have entrance through the vail of his flesh into Heaven as all that believe in him have Heb. 10.19 20. If he had but almost done that work we had been but almost saved that is certainly damned And thus you see briefly the evidences that the work is finished Inference 1. Hath Christ perfected and compleatly finished all his work for us how sweet a relief is this to us that believe in him against all the defects and imperfections of all the works of God that are wrought by us There 's nothing finished that we do All our duties are imperfect duties they come off lamely and defectively from our hands It 's Christs charge against the Church of Sardis Rev. 3.2 I have not found thy works 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 perfect or filled up before God Oh there is much emptiness and vanity in the best of our duties but here 's the grand relief and that which answers to all the grounds of our doubts and fears upon that account Jesus Christ hath finished all his work though
pleasures and enjoyments of the wicked which feed them for the day of slaughter How little stomach can a man have to those dainties that understands the end and meaning of them Give not sleep therefore to thine eyes Reader till thou have got good evidence that thou art of that number whom Iesus hath delivered from wrath to come Till thou canst say he is a Jesus to thee This may be made out to thy satisfaction three waies First If Iesus have delivered thee from sin the cause of wrath thou maist conclude he hath delivered thee from wrath the effect and fruit of sin Upon this account the sweet name of Iesus was imposed upon him Matth. 1.21 Thou shalt call his name Iesus for he shall save his people from their sins Whilst a man lies under the dominion and guilt of sin he lies exposed to wrath to come and when he is delivered from the guilt and power of sin he is certainly delivered from the danger of this coming wrath Where sin is not imputed wrath is not threatened Secondly If thy soul do set an inestimable value on Iesus Christ and be endeared to him upon the account of that inexpressible grace manifested in this deliverance it 's a good sign thy soul hath a share in it Mark what an Epithite the Saints give Christ upon this account Col. 1.12 13. Giving thanks to the Father who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us into the Kingdom of his Dear Son Christ is therefore Dear and dear beyond all compare to his saved ones I remember it 's storied of the poor enthralled Grecians that when Titus Flamminius had restored their ancient liberties and proclamation was to be made in the Market place by an Herald They so prest to hear it that the Herald was in great danger of being stifled and prest to death among the people but when the Proclamation was ended there were heard such shouts and joyful acclamations that the very birds of the air fell down astonished with the noise while they continued to cry 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Saviour a Saviour and all the following night they continued dancing and singing about his Pavilion If such a deliverance so indeared them to Titus How should the great deliverance from wrath to come endear all the Redeemed to love their dear Iesus This is the native effect of mercy on the soul that hath felt it Thirdly To conclude a disposition and readiness of mind to do or endure any thing for Christs sake upon the account of this deliverance from the wrath to come is a good evidence you are so delivered Col. 1.10 11. That we may walk worthy of the Lord to all pleasing being fruitful in every good work There 's readiness to do for Christ. Strengthened with all might according to his glorious power unto all patience and long suffering with Ioyfulness There 's a chearful readiness to endure any thing for Christ. And how both these flow from the sence of this great deliverance from wrath the 12. vers will inform you which was but now cited Oh then be serious and assiduous in the resolution of this grand case Till this be resolved nothing can be pleasant to thy Soul End 2. As the Typical blood was shed and sprinkled to deliver from danger so it was shed to make attonement Levit. 4.20 He shall expiate We translate attone the sin The word imports both And the true meaning is that by the blood of the Bullock all whose efficacy stood in its relation to the blood of Christ signified and shadowed by it the people for whom it was shed should be reconciled to God by the expiation and remission of their sins And what was shadowed in this Typical blood was really designed and accomplisht by Jesus Christ in the shedding of his blood Reconciliation of the Elect to God is therefore another of those beautiful births which Christ travailed for So you find it expresly Rom. 5.10 If when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the Death of his Son This if is not a word of doubting but argumentation The Apostle supposes it as a known truth or principle yielded by all Christians that the death of Christ was to reconcile the Elect to God And again he affirms it with like clearness Col. 1.20 And having made peace by the blood of his Cross by him to reconcile all things And that this was a main and principal end designed both by the Father and Son in the humiliation of Christ is plain from 2 Cor. 5.18 19. God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself God filled the humanity with grace and authority The Spirit of God was in him to qualifie him The authority of God was in him by Commission to make all he did valid The grace and love of God to mankind was in him and one of the principal effects in which it was manifested was this design upon which he came viz. to reconcile the world to God Upon which ground Christ is called the propitiation for our sins 1 Joh. 2.2 Now Reconciliation or attonement is nothing else but the making up of the ancient friendship betwixt God and men which sin had dissolved and so to reduce these enemies into a state of concord and sweet agreement And the means by which this blessed design was effectually compassed was by the death of Christ which made compleat satisfactâ—on to God for the wrong we had done him There was a breach made by sin betwixt God and Angels but that breach is never to be repaired or made up Since as Christ took not on him their nature so he never intended to be a mediator of reconciliation betwixt God and them That will be an Eternal breach But that which Christ designed as the end of his deaâ—h was to reconcile God and man Not the whole species but a certain number whose names were given to Christ. Here I must briefly open First how Christs death Reconciles Secondly why this Reconciliation is brought about by his death rather than any other way Thirdly what are the Articles according to which it 's made And Fourthly what manner of Reconciliation this is First How Christ Reconciles God and men by his death And it must needs be by the satisfaction his Death made to the Justice of God for our sins And so reparation being made the enmity ceases Hence it 's said Isa. 53.5 The chastisement of our peace was upon him and by his stripes are we healed That is as our English Annotators well sense it He was chastized to procure our peace by removal of our sins that set God and us assunder the guilt thereof being discharged with the price of his blood Now this Reconciliation is made and continued betwixt God and us three waies namely by the oblation of Christ which was the price that procured it and so we were virtually or meritoriously reconciled By the application of Christ and his benefits to
Fourthly It imports the soveraignty and supremacy of Christ over all The investiture of Christ with authority over the Empire of both worlds For this belongs to him that sits down upon this throne When the Father said to him sit at my right hand he did therein deliver to him the dispensation and oeconomy of the Kingdom Put the awful scepter of government into his hand and so the Apostle interprets and understands it 1 Cor. 15.25 He must raign till he have put all his enemies under his feet And to thâ—s purpose the same Apostle accommodates if not expounds the words of the Psalmist thou madest him a little lower than the Angels i. e. in respect of his humbled state on earth thou Crownnedst him with glory and honour and didst set him over the work of thy hands thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet Heb. 2.7 8. He is over the spiritual Kingdom the Church absolute Lord there Matth. 28.18 19 20. He also is Lord over the providential Kingdom the whole world Psal. 110.2 and this providential Kingdom being subordinate to his spiritual Kingdom he orders and rules this for the advantage and benefit of that Ephes. 1.22 Fifthly To sit at Gods right hand with his enemies for a footstool implies Christ to be a Conqueror over all his enemies To have ones enemies under his feet notes perfect conquest and compleat victory As when Iosuah set his foot upon the necks of the Kings So Tamberline made proud Bajazet his footstool They trampled his name and his Saints under their feet and Christ will tread them under his feet 'T is true indeed this victory is yet incompleat and inconsummate for now we see not yet all things put under him saith the Apostle but we see Iesus Crowned with glory and honour and that 's enough Enough to shew the power of his enemies is now broken and though they make some opposition still yet it is to no purpose at all for he is so infinitely above them that they must fall before him It is not with Christ as it was with Abiâ—ah against whom Ieroboam prevailed because he was young and tenderhearted and could not withstand them His incapacity and weakness gave the watchful enemy an advantage over him I say 't is not so with Christ he is at Gods right hand And all the power of God stands ready bent to strike through his enemies as it is Psal. 110.5 Sixthly Christs sitting in Heaven notes to us the great and wonderful change that is made upon the state and condition of Christ since his ascention into Heaven Ah 't is far otherwise with him now than it was in the days of his humiliation here on earth quantum mutatus ab illo Oh what a wonderful change hath Heaven made upon him It were good as a Worthy of ours speaks to compare in our thoughts the Abasement of Christ and his Exaltation together as it were in Columes one over against the other he was born in a Stable but now he raigns in his Royal Palace Then he had a Manger for his Cradle but now he sits on a Chair of State Then Oxen and Asses were his companions now thousands of Saints and ten thousand of Angels minister round about his throne Then in contempt they called him the Carpenters Son now he obtains by inheritance a more excellent name than Angels Then he was led away into the Wilderness to be tempted of the Devil now it is proclaimed before him let all the Angels of God worship him Then he had not a place to lay his head on now he is exalted to be heir of all things In his state of Humiliation he endured the contradiction of sinners in his state of Exaltation he is adored and admired of Saints and Angels Then he had no form nor comliness and when we saw him there was no beauty why we should desire him now the beauty of his countenance shall send forth such glorious beams that shall dazel the eyes of all the Coelestial inhabitants round about him c. O what a change is here Here he sweat but there he sits Here he groaned but there he triumphs Here he lay upon the ground there he sits in the throne of glory When he came to Heaven his Father did as it were thus bespeak him My dear Son what an hard travail hast thou had of it What a world of wo hast thou past through in the strength of thy love to me and mine Elect Thou hasâ— been hungry thirsty and weary scourged crucified and reproached ah what bad usage has thou had in the ungrateful world Not a days rest and comfort since thou wentest out from me but now thy suffering days are accomplisht now thy rest is come rest for evermore Henceforth sit at my right hand Henceforth thou shalt groan weep or bleed no more Sit thou at my right hand Seventhly Christs sitting at Gods right hand implies the advancement of believers to the highest honour For this session of Christs respects them and there he sits as our representative in which regard we are made to sit with him in heavenly places as the Apostle speaks Ephes. 2.6 How secure may we be saith Tertullian who do now already possess the Kingdom meaning in our head Christ. This saith another is all my hope and all my confidence namely that we have a portion in that flesh and blood of Christ which is so exalted and therefore where he reigns we shall reign where our flesh is glorified we shall be glorified Surely it 's matter of exceeding joy to believe that Christ our head our flesh and blood is in all this glory at his Fathers right hand Thus we have opened the sence and importance of Christs siâ—ting at his Fathers right hand Hence we Infer Inference 1. Is this so great an honour to Christ to sit enthroned at Gods right hand What honour then is reserved in Heaven for those that are faithful to Christ now on the earth Christ prayed and his prayer was heard Joh. 17.24 That we may be with him to behold the glory that God hath given him and what heart can conceive the felicity of such a sight it made Stephens face shine as the face of an Angel when he had but a glimpse of Christ at his Fathers right hand Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty Isai. 33.17 which respected Hezekiah in the Type Christ in the truth But this is not all though this be much to be spectators of Christ in his Throne of glory we shall not only see him in his Throne but also sit with him inthroned in glory To behold him is much but to sit with him is more I remember it was the saying of a heavenly Christian now with Christ I would far rather look but through the hole of Christs door to see but the one half of his fairest and most comly face for he looks like Heaven suppose I should never win in to