Egypt and its Bondage and the Law-giver from God to whose Laws they were bound in all ages to yeild obedience till the Messiah should be revealed So also the Son of man was appointed and is made of God the Redeemer and Deliverer of us Mankind from the hands of our Spiritual Enemies and from all that hate us Luk. 1.70 72 73. Especially his followers and obeyers those that believe in him and are made the Seed or Israel of God in and by him He being also as Abraham and Israel was their Father The Everlasting Father of this Spiritual off-spring Isa 9.6 And he is the great Law-giver to the World for whose Laws the Iles or Gentiles are to wait and to them to yeild obedience to the end of the World For the Lord is our Law-giver Isa 33.22 42.1 4. 2. Again as Joshua was a Saviour and the bringer of them into the Inheritance which God had promised to their Fathers delivering them from the Inhabitants of that Land the Cananites utterly destroying them before them and dividing their Land to them by Lot So also Jesus the Son of Man was to be and is exalted and lifted up of God to be the expeller and driver out of Sathan and his Angels the powers of darkness out of their possession and the bringer in of his People the Israel of God that follow him into the heavenly Country and City of God which he hath promised to the spiritual Israel that are subject to him driving out all the power of Sin and Corruption from them Yea and in due time driving out all the Tyrants of the World with their Captains and Ring-leaders into Destruction he shall possess his People of the glorious Kingdom and divide to them their several portions and rewards in giving the Kingdom and Dominion and greatness of the Kingdom to the Saints of the most high God whose Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom and his dominion that that shall have no end Dan. 7.27 3. As they had Judges also to be their helpers and Saviours from their enemies and to judge and avenge them of them and order their Affairs So Christ the Son of Man is raised up and appointed of God to be the great Judge the pleader of the Causes and avenger of Man-kind against Sathan and the Powers of Darkness And more especially of his Israel the Seed and Sons of God through the faith of him against all their Enemies Yea the great Judge of quick and dead who shall raise up all from their Graves and gather them together from all quarters of the World determining all Cases deciding all controversies and finally disposing to every man according to his Works everlasting rewards or punishments in Justice and Righteousness And seeing his Sentences put in execution with great and irresistible Power and Authority Act. 10.42 17.30 31. But perhaps we might as well have reduced these last mentioned offices or honours unto that that follows Viz. That 4. Whereas they had Kings set over them to go in and out before them to be their Captains and Leaders and to appoint Officers under them giving them Laws and Commands fighting their Battels and so to subdue their enemies protect them in peace and quietness in the peaceable possession of their Inheritances and enlarge their borders c. And so Moses also was said to be King in Jesurun So Christ this Son of Man is lifted up of God to that Authority and Sovereign dignity made his King by him set upon his holy hill of Sion Psal 2.1 2 6 7. And Maugre all opposition made by the Heathen and People the Kings and Rulers the Jews and Gentiles Herod and Pontius Pilate and all or any of their Successors that set themselves against him Act. 4.26 29. The King of Nations Jer. 10.7 Yea Of all the Earth Psal 47.7 And the King of Saints Rev. 15.4 5. A Great King above all Gods Psal 95.2 The Lord is our Law-giver the Lord is our Judge The Lord is our King and he will save us Isa 33.20 Yea and further 5. Whereas their Priests and Kings and once we find a Prophet was anointed by Gods appointment to their several offices and so designed of God to them upon which also as we sometime find God gave his Spirit to fit them for the discharge of them as thereby also they were seperated from others to attend unto God to serve him and his People therein and receive his help and supplies for the same So also the Son of Man Christ Jesus was to be and is and was anointed of God with the holy Ghost and Power Act. 10.38 To design seperate and authorize him to and furnish him for all those Offices and undertakings to which God appointed and called him As for the discharge of his Prophetick Office and work it is said The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to Preach glad tidings to the poor to bind up the broken hearted c. Isa 61.1 2. With Luk. 4 18 19. for by his word and the Divine force and power of his holy Spirit breathing forth his grace therein He is as a great yea the great and only Phisician of the Soul and his words do good like a Medicine being words of grace words of eternal life pleasant words that are like a honey-comb pleasant to the taste and healing to the bones Prov. 15.14 16.24 Wholsome and sound and healing words are the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Doctrine that is according to Godliness 1 Tim. 6.3 4 Again it is said Behold my Servant whom I uphold mine Elect in whom my soul delighteth I have put my holy Spirit upon him he shall bring forth Judgment to the Gentiles c. Isa 42.1 And as the great King the Great God and our Governour He is Gods Christ or Anointed whom he hath set upon his holy hill of Sion Psal 2.2 6. And anointed with the Oyl of gladness above his fellows Psal 45.6 7. And as the most holy even the most holy High Priest who is holy harmless undefiled seperated from Sinners He may be understood to be the Anointed or Messiah spoken of by Daniel Dan. 9.24 When he saith To Anoint the most holy And so that he was Consecrated that way also as well as by the word of the Oath Though the former was tipyfied in Aaron and his Sons Sanctified and Consecrated with the holy anointing Oyl powred upon and anointing them Exod. 30.29 30. Levit. 8.12 And the latter exceeded them Heb. 7.20 21 28 To Minister before the Lord for ever Sure it is that Through the Eternal Spirit he offered up himself as the spotless Sacrifice Heb. 9.14 And with reference to this anointing him and furnishing him with the fullness of the holy Ghost The Spirit of wisdom and of understanding the Spirit of counsel and of might the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord that rests and abides upon him and makes him quick
THE BRAZEN SERPENT OR GOD'S Grand Design VIZ. CHRIST'S Exaltation for MAN'S Salvation in his believing on Him OR The Right Way to Regeneration and therethrough to the Heavenly and Eternal Kingdom Discovered by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself for our sure Direction therein Considered Opened and Applyed with a double Excursion touching the Glory and Excellency 1. Of the Gospel of Christ 2. Of Christ Himself By J. HORN an Unworthy Servant of God in the Gospel of his Son Jesus Christ and sometimes Minister of Lin Allhallows in Norfolk Isa 52.13 Behold my Servant shall deal prudently or shall prosper He shall be exalted extolled and be very high As many were astonied at thee his visage was so marred more than any Man and his form more than the Sons of Men so shall He sprinkle many Nations the Kings shall shut their mouths at Him c. Isa 55.5 Nations that knew not thee shall run unto thee because of the Lord thy God and for the holy one of Israel for He hath glorified thee Psal 99.10 Exalt the Lord our God and worship at his Foot-stool for He is holy Psal 21.13 Be thou exalted O Lord in thine own strength so will we sing and praise thy power Respiciamus nos in faciem serpentis aenci elevati Christi si volumus à pravorum Daemonum suggestionibus serpentinis liberari respicere autem est fide in ipsum tendere Bern. de pass Dominica LONDON Printed for Benjamin Southwood at the Star near to Serjeants Inn in Chancery-Lane 1673. THE EPISTLE TO THE READER Gentle Reader LO Here I present thee with what as to the matter treated of is a most needful and excellent Subject worthy thy most serious consideration the Grand Design of the God of Glory the Devise that He in his Infinite wisdome and goodness devised for our recovery from sin and misery and for reducing and bringing us back to life and safety the product and birth of his eternal purposes and most deep counsels for our welfare and happiness A Subject never sufficiently looked upon never throughly enough seen into while we can see but with mortal eyes and imperfect understandings the great Mystery of Godliness God manifested in the Flesh justified in the Spirit seen yea very intensively pryed into 1 Pet. 1.12 of Angels preached to us Gentiles believed on in the World received up into Glory 1 Tim. 3.16 The great Catholicon the Soveraign and Vniversal Remedy for all our spiritual distempers and diseases the supply of all our wants the support of us in all our weaknesses temptations and troubles the instructer and helper of us in and unto all our services the stay of us in this life in and under all its various vicissitudes and changes the joy and comfort of our hearts in Death the Raiser and Resurrection both of our Souls to lively hope and comfort when oppressed with griefs and cast down with sadness and also of our Bodies to immortality and Eternal happiness in a word the spring original and fountain of all our felicity the great subject of the Doctrine both of the holy Prophets and of the holy Apostles the substance and body of all the types and shadows in the Law of Moses the accomplishment and fulfilling of Predictions and Prophecies and the ground and end of all our future hopes and expectations Such I say not is this Treatise but the subject treated of and directed to herein for it is no other than Christ himself and Him crucified and through sufferings and death raised up again and glorified Glorified of God for thee in his own glorious actings in and upon Him and glorified of God to thee by the spirit of God in his word and testimony glorified both ways to save and deliver thee from the stings of the old Serpent and to bring thee to glory A Subject which who can sufficiently treat of for who can shew forth all his marvailous acts who can set forth all his praises Psal 106.2 A Subject much too great for my imbecillity and stupidity too deep and high and large and long for my narrow head and heart to reach its dimensions so as to handle it and set it forth worthily A Subject in my reception of it into and conception of this Discourse about it in my mind and earnestness of my heart to draw it out and incorporate it in this body and give it these lines and lineaments so pleasing to me or perhaps rather my exercise therein that it drew me on with so eager an intention and rapid a motion as indangered my miscarrying of it before its perfection for I received in my self in a manner the sentence of Death before I had finished it till God renewing my strength beyond my expectation and confidence it attained to this Period God therein both shewing me my weakness and perhaps also chastening my unworthiness and unmeetness for such an undertaking and my darkning wisdome so much by words without knowledge and so slenderly and slovenly handling so excellent a subject both therein and since in its sticking so long and coming out at length with so many Errata's in its impression and yet also shewing his great power and goodness in what I received of him for my reviving I confess I had some eye in it upon a good and gracious Woman who had met with some exercise in the death of her only Son and intended she should have had one of the first rights of it as for comforting her also I put in some expressions respecting that her tryal in some part of its application but the Lord pleased to put an end to her days also before it could arrive at her and be perused by her He designing to comfort and satisfy her spirit I trust with another and far perfecter sight of the glory of this blessed Son of man here treated of then this so weak a discourse could have given her of him I trust its conception was not altogether without the Holy Ghost though as it was imbodyed in and by me I cannot but see and acknowledge its too great likeness to me in imperfection It is a rule in Philosophy that Quicquid recipitur recipitur ad modum recipientis Whatsoever is received of another is received after the manner or measure of the receiver We cannot expect that a Bucket can contain the Ocean and the purest Wine received in a fusty Cask will somewhat tast of it The Eternal Word as conceived in the Virgins Womb was made partaker of her Flesh and as therein brought forth by her appeared a weak and little one not according to the Immensity and Infinity of the Word but in such small and finite dimensions as agreed to the humane nature and the narrowness of her Womb in which it was formed and therefore He was capable of being wrapt in swadling cloths and laid in a Manger and afterward of being taken up in old Simeon's armes and of growing in stature in wisdome and in favour both with God
to no godly edifying Or leading men to walk in a road of Practices Observations and Performances of External duties without the Root the great mystery of godliness the right understanding perception and receit of the grace of God in Christ so as to the renewing them in the Spirit of their mind about which there is in many both Teachers and Professors of Religion exceeding great blindness and thence incertainty and confusion in their apprehensions The labour of the foolish wearying every one of them because they know not the way into the City Eccles 10.15 Much zeal there is and may be about the outward form and time of Baptisme the manner and way of Praying receit of the Supper or Communion Hearing Fasting the times and places of Worship with its Formes and Ceremonies yea and about walking in divers Religious practices when yet inwardly pride and arrogancy confidence in our selves our own frames or works with unbelief and rejection of the Grace and Truth of God Despising Hating and even Persecuting men because differing in their modes and apprehensions Envy Malice Covetousness Fraud and such like things lurk and bear sway underneath And yet men are apt to think all is well with them and incourage themselves and one another to expect Gods Kingdom Crying Peace peace where God speaks not peace and healing the hurts slightly that should be made sound like those in Jeremiahs days that thought their having Gods Temple and Worship among them should secure them from Judgment though their hearts were uncircumcised and their ways and doings naught and unmended But it s good to take heed to sound Doctrine the wholesome words of our Lord Jesus Christ and of his holy ones taught and instructed by him for they spake what they knew and testified what they see not stearing our course by the multitude for so we should be rejecters of the Truth For Christs Doctrine was not so crouded after as to be heartily imbraced by the most for then would he not have said We speak what we know and testifie what we have seen and no man receiveth our testimony wherein after signification of his own and his holy Servants fitness for teaching others and faithfulness in teaching he faults and complains of the too great want of credit to and receit of their faithful teachings by the generality of men which he yet signifyeth to be the more inexcusable because he spake but hitherto of things Earthly or done upon earth and therefore thence argues their greater unfitness and incapacity for Heavenly things more properly and in a fuller sense such If I have told you Earthly things and ye believe not how shall ye believe if I tell you of Heavenly v. 12. As implying also his fitness and ability for declaring the heavenly things the things done or to be done in Heaven also Yea and he further signifies his only fitness and sufficiency for declaring them in what he adds viz. when he saith ver 13. And no man hath ascended up into Heaven but he that came down from Heaven even the Son of Man who is in Heaven Signifying as his own descent from and yet being in Heaven so that none but He That Son of Man is fit or able to declare the things of Heaven because none else came down thence furnished with the Knowledge of them And whereas Nicodemus might still be more amazed at these intimations of his coming down from Heaven ascending up to Heaven and being in Heaven even while he see and heard him on the Earth speaking to him he adds the words of the Text. And as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness so must the Son of man be lifted up that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have eternal life Of which he gives the reason in the next verses For God so loved the World that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life c. Whence we may note by the way that Christ did not for Regenerating Nicodemus Preach to him some particular love or special manifestation of it to him more than to others but generally love or grace even the love of God to the World As the Apostle Paul also tells us that that which saved him and others from their natural and sinful state was the appearance of the love and pity of God to mankind Tit. 3.3 4. He saith not it was some peculiar love to them more then to others that was made to appear as the object upon which their eyes and hearts were fastned but the love of God to man more indefinitely and generally And therefore they are not to be heard who rejecting the Testimony of Gods love and grace to mankind and to the World make it their first and main business to Preach special and particular love to some elect and chosen ones as the way to bring Souls in to God Let us follow the way our Saviour hath walked in before us Preach to men Gods good will and love as testifyed to all in general in the gift of Christ and leave it to God to bear testimony to the word of his grace and to work therewith opening their understandings and perswading their hearts to imbrace it and evidencing and bearing witness to them as he who knows their hearts sees good Act. 14.3 15.8 CHAP. II. The words of the Text considered its parts Four main points thence Observed The first point spoken to viz. The Type of the Brazen Serpent lifted up in some brief notes upon it LET us veiw the words themselves which I have chosen to treat on wherein we have 1. The main thing asserted viz. That the Son of Man must be lifted up 2. The manner of it proposed by way of similitude As Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness so must the Son of Man be lifted up 3. The end of it declared viz. That whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have Eternal Life We may note from the words also these several notes or points 1. That Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness that 's supposed and implied 2. That the Son of Man must be lifted up that 's mainly asserted 3. That this latter must answer to the former The lifting up the Son of Man must answer to the lifting up the Serpent by Moses in the Wilderness As Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness so must the Son of Man be lifted up 4. That the end of the Son of Mans being so lifted up is That whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have eternal life To the first Point which is the comparison or that by which the lifting up of the Son of Man is illustrated and set forth viz. Moses his lifting up the Serpent in the Wilderness I shall speak more briefly the other points being more principally intended And in speaking thereto I note 1. The thing set up A Serpent 2. The cause or reason of
I begotten thee And Sit thou on my right hand till I make thy foes thy foot-stool Heb. 1.5.13 Yea All the fullness of the God-head dwells in him bodily Col. 2.9 2. A State of greater Authority Power and Majesty For he is set above all Authorities Principalities Powers Thrones Might or Dominion yea and every name that is named not only in this World but in that which is to come Eph. 1.21 For He hath put all things under his feet And Given him to be Head over all things to his Church ver 22. The Head top or chief of all Principality and Power Col. 2.10 Not only Lord of Lords and King of Kings Gods first-born higher then the Kings of the Earth As Rev. 17.14 19.16 Psal 89.27 But he is also A great King above all Gods Psal 95.2 Angels and Principalities and Powers being made subject to him 1 Pet. 3.22 Lord of all Act. 10.36 Being made in the Nature of Man so much better higher and more glorious then the Angels at he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name then they being not only owned of God as his Son begotten by him from the dead to all this excelâ—ent glory dignity and majesty even to be set at his right hand on the Throne of Majesty in the highest Heb. 1.3 4 5 13. 8.1 But as set on Gods own Throne Rev. 3.21 So as it 's said to all other Potestates and Powers Let all the Angels of God Or as in Psal 97.7 Worship him all ye Gods And again to him it is said Thy Throne O God endureth for ever The Sceptre of thy Kingdom is a Sceptre of Righteousness or a right Sceptre Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity Therefore God thy God hath anointed thee with the oyl of gladness above thy fellows Above all other Gods Potentates or Powers among either Men or Angels And thou Lord Jehovah in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the Earth and the Heavens are the work of thy hands they shall perish but thou remainest they shall all wax old as a Garment as a Vesture shalt thou change them Or fold them up And they shall be changed but thou endurest and thy years shall not fail Heb. 1.6 8 9 10 11 12. Yea the Angels are all Ministring Spirits to him commanded by him and with one consent proclaim him the excellent and worthy one Worthy to receive Power and Riches and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing Rev. 5.11.12 In a word All Authority and Power in Heaven and over the Earth is given unto him And all that the Father hath is his Even all the Authority Power and fullness of the Father and it pleases to dwell in him Mat. 28.18 John 16.14 15. Col. 1.19 2.9 So that it may well be said as the Prophet foresaw That He is exalted extolled and very high Higher then Moses then Adam or David as some Jewish Criticks observe from the letters of the word Translated very being made up of the initial letters of those three Names Yea and should they to Adam joyn Abraham too whose name begins with the same letter their observation might hold true Isa 52.13 And herein also he is lifted up and so it behoved that he should be that he should suffer such things as he did and so should enter into Glory Luk. 24.26 That he might exercise and discharge the most glorious Offices most useful for us and most honourable for himself for and concerning our welfare and happiness Such as wherein he answers to all the most excellent and honourable things and persons under the Law and among the Israel after thâ— flesh that was lifted up to any honourable and useful Office or Service as the Covenant of Circumcision the Sabbaoth Sacrifices Temple c. Of which I may say more elsewhere I shall here only mention such Offices as were estated upon and exercised by most honourable persons amongst them as 1. The Prophets were holy and honourable persons and the office of a Prophet a most excellent useful and honourable imployment they having intercourse and Power with God and receiving their message from him for directing the people into the knowledge of him and of his mind and will concerning them Whence that of God to Abimelech concerning Abraham Restore the man his wife For he is a Prophet and he shall pray for thee Gen. 20.7 And Do my Prophets no harm Psal â—05 15 The Son of Man was to be and is lifted up into that honour and office For this is he of whom it was said A Prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you from among your Brethren like unto me him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you Deut. 18.15 18. With Act. 3.22 23. The Great Prophet And The Testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Prophecy Rev. 19.10 The Great Light In his Testimony Word and Doctrine and the true Light lightning every man coming into the World Who came a Light into the World that whosoever believeth on and followeth him may not abide in darkness but see the Light of Life John 1.9 8.12 12.46 And so I might say also of the Apostles That they were highly honourable and useful as to their office and he is the Great Apostle of our Profession Heb. 3.1 2. The Priests were holy and honourable Persons under the Law in respect of their Office And the Priesthood a most honourable and useful Office for making attonement and Reconciliation for the People by offering gifts and Sacrifices for them to that purpose their lips keeping Knowledge also and teaching the People the Law And Christ the Son of Man was to be and is exalted to that Honour and Office to be the Priest the great High Priest after the order of Melchisedech As God did raise him up to be his Prophet and Apostle giving him that honour and glory that no man in Heaven or Earth or under the Earth was found worthy of even to open the book of Gods Counsels and unloose the Seals of it and unfold the Mysteries therein contained Rev. 5.2 3 6. So he gave him also the honour and Office of the Priest-hood For no man takes to himself that honour of the High Priest-hood but he that is called of God as Aaron was Wherefore Christ also glorified not himself to be made an High Priest but he that said to him Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee Said also to him Thou art a Priest to me for ever after the Order of Melchisedec Yea the Lord sware and will not repent saying Thou art a Priest for ever c. Heb. 5.3 4 5. c. 3. Whereas some of the Prophets or Priests had other additional honours beside merely their being Prophets and Priests or the like Christ is lifted up in this his glory unto such honour also As to say 1. Whereas Moses was also a Deliverer of them by the Power of God out of
from henceforth and for ever That he should be Gods first-born higher then the Kings of the Earth Having an everlasting Throne and Kingdom Preaching peace to the Heathen bringing forth Judgment to them and affording glorious rest and blessing to all that trust in him Psal 2.6 12. 89.3 4 19 20 25 26 27. 132.11 17 18. Isa 6.9 10. 11.1 10. 42.1 4. Zech. 9.9.10 That he should be a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedeck Psal 110.3 And many such excellent and high commendations as may be seen in what he fore-signified to and by the Prophets of his Sufferings and of the Glory that should follow in all the Scriptures 1 Pet. 1.10 11 12. With Luk. 24.27 And so the Apostle saith speaking of the perfection of the Sacrifice and Priesthood of Christ Whereof the holy Ghost is a Witness to us for after he had said before This is the Covenant that I will make with them After those days saith the Lord I will put my Laws into their hearts and in 〈◊〉 minds will I write them He adds And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more Heb. 10.15 16 17. As it is also said that in ordering the Sanctuary or holy place with the Ordinances of it The holy Ghost this signified that the way into the holy of holies was not yet made manifest while the first Tabernacle was standing Heb. 9.8 In a word Whatever things the holy men of God did foreshew of the coming of the Just One and the things to be found and effected by him they spake not of themselves but as they were moâ—ed thereto by the holy Ghost Whence they who resisted them in their Testimony resisted the holy Ghost 1 Pet. 1.10 11 12. 2 Pet. 1.19 20 21. Act. 7.51 52. 2. In preparing and Sanctifying that blessed Body taken by him in which he was made the Son of Man Luk. 1.35 And appearing visibly to Descend and rest upon him in it in the likeness of a Dove as a Sign and signification of his being the Christ Mat. 3.17 John 1.31 32 33. In his anointing filling and working in and by him in all his Doctrine and Miracles assisting and strengthening him in all his temptations sufferings and services Matt. 4.1 Luk. 4.1.14.18 21. Mark 3.29 30. And in his raising and carrying up his body into Heaven For in the Eternal Spirit he offered up himself without spot to God Heb. 9.14 Rom. 6.4 But these things were evident some of them but to few Therefore I add that he witnessed to him more openly 3. In his gifting and furnishing the Apostles and Prophets and Servants of God for their work and service in the Gospel and for that purpose miraculously descending upon and working in many of them strengthning and helping them yea doing great Miracles and Signs by them and through their Doctrine and Miracles working upon the World to convince them of sin for not believing on him c. As our Saviour said When the Comforter shall come even the holy Ghost he shall bear witness of me and he shall convince or reprove the World of Sin of Righteousness and of Judgment c. And in that he did Baptise or Wash and Sanctifie the Apostles so preparing and fitting them for their holy Work and Service lead them into all truth glorifie Christ taking of his things and shewing them John 15.26 27. 16.8 9 13 14 15. Act. 1.5 8. 2.2 3 4 17 18. 4.31 And that the holy Ghost that God gave to them that believed on or obeyed Christ was a witness to him and to his glory is said Act. 5 32. And this also was a Testimony from God the Father as it is said God bare them witness by Signs and Wonders and divers Miracles and gifts of the holy Ghost Heb. 2.4 As also the holy Ghost bears witness to the hearts and consciences of men concerning him Rom. 8.15 16. 2 Cor. 3.3 6 8 18. Causing the believing heart to see his glory as in a glass with open face to the changing it into his likeness from glory to glory But this he doth chiefly 4. In his Doctrine and teaching in and by the Gospel in his Revelation of him to and by the Apostles and to the World and Churches gathered out thereof As to them also the Spirit hath said Great and Glorious things as may be seen in those Epistles to the Seven Churches Rev. 2. 3. And thus the Three in Heaven the Father the Word and the holy Ghost bare witness of and to and therein lifted up the Son of Man and so is he lifted up of God and must be fully lifted up at his glorious coming and Kingdom when he shall appear in his own glory and in the glory of his Father and of his holy Angels Luk. 9.26 For the Great God the blessed and holy Potentate who only hath immortality dwelling in the Light which no man can approach unto and which no man hath seen nor can see to whom be honour and power for ever and ever Amen will in his time shew him When he shall come and appear sitting on the right hand of God with Power and great Glory and pâ—ssâ—ss the great and glorious Kingdom which God hath promised to possess him of and to Admâ—nister by him but â—â—sâ—e ms to be beyond what this Text speaks of which speaks of his being lifted up that men might in believing on him not perish but have eternal Life And so of that which is in order of Nature if not also of time before mens believing on him And these particulars chiefly of the Spirits witnessing to him and lifting him up were and are needful and such as must be 1. That he might receive the Glory promised For God said that he would glorifie him Isa 49.7 55.5 And God cannot lye Yea he hath sworn by his holiness that he will not lye unto David his Seed shall endure for ever and his Throne as the Sun which is all glorious bright and lightsome before him Psal 89.35 36. Yea and 2. That men might run unto him and believe on him As it is said Kings shall see and arise Princes shall also worship him because of the Lord that is faithful and he shall chuse thee Isa 49.7 And thou shalt call a Nation whom thou knewest not and Nations that knew not thee shall run unto thee because of the Lord thy God and for the holy one of Israel for he hath glorified thee Isa 55 5. But unto this it was and is needful also that he be lifted up 2. Subordinately by Creatures and here we might consider 1. The holy Angels they have lifted him up in their honourable Testimony of him as the Son of Man The Word made Flesh They having also seen this Mystery and peeped down curiously to pry into it 1. Tim. 3.16 1 Pet. 1.12 And they have brought down honourable messages and discoveries concerning him He being as the Son of Man the Ladder
Pet. 3.18 As it follows here That whosoever believes ◠him might not perish but have Eternal Life 3. As to his abundant Love Charity Goodness and Grace in all this such as passeth Knowledge Eph. 7.18 19. And therein the love of God the Father in appointing preparing sanctifying and furnishing him to all this great business and undertaking John 3.16 1 John 4.9 10 14. It was by the grace of God that He tasted Death for every one Heb. 2.9 And his own grace even The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ it was to abase himself And when rich to become poor for our sakes th◠we through his poverty might be made rich 2 Cor. 8.9 And so to lay down his life for us even when and though ungodly and enemies worthy of no love at all much less of such and so great love 1 John 3.16 17. Rom. 5.6 7 8. John 3.16 Love worthy admiration acceptation and imitation by us Eph. 5.1 2 3.18 19. Stronger then death such as many waters could not quench it nor the flouds drown it Cant. 8.6 7. Fourthly In the preciousness of his Abasement Obedience Bloud Death Sufferings and Sacrifice for us That however he was therein made low and despicable among men and became an offence to the worldly-wise and honourable yet He in and by them was a most acceptable Sacrifice to God an offering of a sweet smelling savour 1 Cor. 1.22 23. Eph. 5.2 That for which we all have great cause to love and admire him and flee for refuge and sanctuary to him He having therein made peace for us slain the enmity broken down the wull of partition between God and man and between Jew and Gentile wrought Reconciliation or that where-through we may be reconciled or made at one with God Col. 1.20 Eph. 2.14 15 16. 2 Cor. 5.19 20 21. having therein given himself a Ransome for all 1 Tim. 2.6 and being become there through the Propitiation for our sins yea for the sins of the whole world 1 John 2.1 2. and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 propitiatory or Mercy-seat through faith in his bloud for remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God and for the declaration of his righteousness therein that he is just and the justifier of those that believe in Jesus Rom. 3.25 26. There being therein Redemption and through that Redemption a free Justification 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to or for all and upon all that believe v. 22.24 There-through the hand-writing of Ordinances that was against us being blotted out and what was contrary to us taken out of the way and nailed to his Cross and Principalities and powers thereby spoiled and triumphed over by him Col. 2.14 15. So that great is the power and vertue of that his despised and reproched Cross So as that it 's accepted of God far before and above all the Sacrifices and Services ordained by him in the Law of Moses they being not able to take away sin But this one Sacrifice is so powerful and prevalent a purgation and expiation of it that Christ hath by that one Sacrifice once offered perfected for ever those that are sanctified So that the Consciences of the comers to God there-through are purged from dead works to serve the living God Heb. 1.3 9.14 10.2 3 4 5 10 14. So as that there-through we may have access to God in the holy of holies and may draw nigh to him and call upon him with full assurance of faith and confidence Heb. 10.19 22. His precious Bloud being the Bloud of sprinkling for sprinkling the heart from an evil conscience and speaking better things then the bloud of Abel Heb. 12.24 Therefore also the Cross of Christ the onely thing to be gloried in by us Gal. 6.14 Fifthly In the exceeding greatness of that Glory that God hath given him as a reward of his sufferings and hard service sustained against the World and Sathan for us Wherein also is further evidenced the exceeding preciousness of his Bloud and Sufferings the infinite value of them and the force and vertue they have in them with him They set forth his Glory to be far above all the glory of the world yea or the glory of Moses or any of the former glorious ones then the Glory of Solomon and the Glory of his Ministration Far transcending that of the Law as being more powerful in the discoveries of it for transforming the beholders of it into his likeness so as when we see him as he is we shall there-through be made like him 2 Corinthians 3.3 8 9 18. 1 John 3.2 Col. 3.4 For they declare that God hath glorified him with his own self filled him with all his fulness so as all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in him bodily and so as that in him we are compleat Col. 1.19 2.9 Oh let us go out and see this King Solomon this excellent Prince of Peace the Peace and Peace-maker of whom and of whose Glory Solomon of old was but a type and figure and the glory and lustre of his Kingdom but a type and figure of the the Glory of his which passeth all our conceptions and expressions let us go forth I say and behold him with the Crown wherewith his Mother the infinite Wisdom Love and Grace of God as also his Disciples who have heard and received the Word of God and kept it who are to him as his Mother Brethren and Sisters Matth. 12.49 50 have crowned him in the day of his espousals and of the gladness of his heart When being espoused to the nature of man he received the holy Spirit and poured it forth upon them Cant. 3.13 Matth. 22.1 Acts 2.33 But indeed it is not to be fully seen and known till the great day of his appearance the time of the appearing of the glory of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ Tit. 2.13 1 John 3.2 Sixthly In his perfect and compleat Furniture wherewith he is furnished for executing and performing the works of his glorious Offices and bringing about the end of them the salvation of man the eternal salvation of all that obey him in which they present us as compleatly provided for of all things pertaining to life and godliness as given to him and dwelling in him for us I shall here onely touch upon something thereof in some few Particulars As First They declare him to be the great Prophet and as such fully and perfectly accomplished with ability fitness and faithfulness for teaching us the knowledge of himself and of God and of all things As being filled to that purpose with the fulness of God the gift of the Holy Ghost being so immeasurably received by him that he hath the seven spirits that are before the Throne Rev. 1.4 3.1 The fulness of the Holy Ghost and of all spiritual gifts for both giving forth to men and enabling and moving men to receive the exact and perfect knowledge of God and for gifting whom
all sins and trespasses through the virtue of his most precious Blood Acts 3.19 Mat. 25.35 36 46. And thus being preserved and saved by him they shall not perish from the way nor in the end but shall have Eternal Life of which we have nextly to consider CHAP XIV Of the second Branch of the fifth observation what Eternal Life is and how the believer on Christ shall have it Qu. 3 THe third Query to be considered under this Observation is what that Eternal Life is which the believer on the Son of man shall have To which I answer briefly that 1. It 's not this natural life for that with all its enjoyments must and will have an end and its good to mind that and the shortness and hiddenness of the time of it and the hiddenness and oft times suddenness of the coming of death that we may not trust to this life or rest in any of its enjoyments but be moved more diligently to seek after and lay hold of that which is indeed Eternal life concerning which I may add that 2. It 's more and hath more in it then can be now either fully expressed or conceived only some hints of it we have in the Scriptures and according to them we may understand something thereof and so we find that it is variously set forth and spoken of in the Scriptures as sometimes 1. By the causes of it or that from whence it springs and issues and so 1. Jesus Christ himself is called Eternal Life the life of the believer when Christ who is our life shall appear Col. 3.4 I am the Way the Truth and the life Joh. 14.6 The bread of life that he that eats shall live by and shall live for ever Joh. 6 51. The resurrection and the life Joh. 11.25 Yea expresly that Eternal life that was with the Father and was manifested to us 1 Joh. 1.2 And we know that the Son of God is come and hath given us an understanding heart to know him that is true and we are in him that is true even in his Son Jesus christ this is the true God and Eternal life 1 Joh. 5.19 20. And its true to say That he that believeth on the Son of man shall have him as in Heb. 3.14 Now are we partakers of Christ if we hold fast the beginning of our Confidence stedfast to the end we have and shall have him here with us and for us I am my beloveds and my beloved is mine Cant. 2.16 6.3 And he saith I will be with thee I will never leave thee nor forsake thee Deut. 31.6 8. Josh 1.5 with Heb. 13.5 And we shall have him for ever with us and be ever with him in the new Heavens and new Earth and new Jerusalem in the world to come Rev. 21.3 4. with 1 Thes 4.16 17. 2. The favour of God in Christ is life In thy favour is life Psal 30.5 And this he shall have that believeth on Christ the Son of man He that finds him who is the wisdom of God finds life and shall obtain favour of the Lord. Prov. 8.34 And this is such a life as nothing can happen to the believer on him that can extinguish it or prevail against it I am perswaded neither Life nor Death nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come nor heighth nor depth nor any other Creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus Rom. 8.38 39. That we believing on him should not be failed by him or deprived of his favour to us that 's without all peradventure included in it 3. The knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ is Eternal life This is life Eternal that they may know thee the only true God and him whom thou hast sent Jesus Christ Joh. 17.3 And this they who believe on the Son of man shall have for they shall receive the holy Spirit the Spirit of the Father and of the Son that shall teach them all things so as they shall not in the issue need to say one to another Know the Lord for they shall know him from the least to the greatest as is expresly promised in the Covenant or New Testament whereof Jesus Christ is the Mediator and which he hath undertaken to see performed to them that believe on him and depart not from him See Joh. 7.38 39 14.26 16.13 with Heb. 8.11 2. Sometime for the effect of Christ and of the knowledge and favour of God both as enjoyable here through faith and as enjoyable hereafter in the full fruition when those that see now darkly through a Glass stall see as they are seen and know as they are known 1 Cor. 13.12 And that effect is the living joyful happy state of the Soul and so of the whole man for ever as it is said He shall live for ever and he shall never die Joh. 6.51 58. and 11.25 26. Which is spoken of the Spiritual and Heavenly life or state of the Soul here and hereafter joyful and happy never to have end but especially of the state both of the body soul together hereafter and it includes and contains in it both 1. A continual living in a state of forgiveness and acceptance with God which is a truly joyful and happy state in which the Soul hath cause of real joy and gladness as it is said Blessed is the man whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin Psal 32.1 2. Blessed is the man who knows the joyful sound Psal 89.15 And happy is the man who hath the God of Jacob for his help c. Psal 146.5 6. A state in which the Soul is passed from death to life and shall not come into condemnation Joh. 5.24 2. A continual in dwelling of the the Spirit of Life as a Spring of Spiritual Life and motion toward God and for him even the Spirit of God which is the Spirit of life and the operation and efficacy of him in the Soul though not always sensibly felt here as it is said He that drinketh of the water that I shall give him it stall be in him a Spring of living waters springing up in him unto Etetnal life Joh 4.14 So as this Spring shall never fail him that believeth going on and continuing to believe on the Son of man 3. A continual state of safety from all evil so as to its being destructive or hurtful to the Soul or in due time affective and a state of Title to and Interest in yea and injoyment of all that is good in a first-fruits and by Spirit here and fully and actually and for ever hereafter there shall no evil happen to the just Prov. 12.21 All things are the believers 1 Cor 3.21 And all things shall work together for his good Rom. 8.28 Psal 25.10 The Lord God is a Son and a Shield and he will give grace and glory and
affliction we must enter into Gods Kingdom Acts 14.22 No partaking of this life but through death and that 1. Through a Spiritual Death or death in and of our Spirits to false life as to the life of or in sin life to the world and to the Law as thinking to have life thereby as in our own righteousness according thereunto No living to righteousness and to God but in dying to sin and to the world so as to cease to be slaves or servants to them Rom. 6.10 11. Gal. 6.14 1 Pet. 2.24 nor is there any living to Christ and so to God but through dying to the Law as to our hopes and rejoycings in our own righteousness according thereunto Gal. 2.19 And in these kinds of deaths there are pains in self-denials taking up our cross for Christs sake Mat. 16.24 2. Through the bodily Death for neither is there any entring into the joys and glories of Heaven and of the life to come so as to the actual full fruition of them but through bodily Death and Grave except of such as shall be found alive at his appearing 1 Thes 4.15 16. that so we may be made conformable to the death of Christ and be planted therethrough into the likeness of his Resurrection in our body also For the way to this life is also 2. Through the Resurrection from the dead otherwise if we should dye in our selves to false lives and never rise up in a true and divine life we could not have eternal life The life of Christ is a life from the dead whence he is called the first begotten or first-born from the dead Col. 1.18 Rev. 1.5 and so all that share with him therein are raised up to a life from the dead too First raised up in their spirits with him through the faith of the operation of God Col. 2.12 3.1 crucified with Christ to self and flesh and sin and all false life but yet so as they live yet not they but Christ liveth in them Gal. 2.20 And then also at the great day of Christs glorious appearing their dead bodies shall be raised up by him and be made like his Thence the Resurrection said to be to those that have done good a Resurrection to Life Joh. 5.28 29. and Christ in telling us that they who believe on him shall have everlasting life once and again adds And I will raise him up at the last day Joh. 6.40.44 as implying that they must pass through death and be raised up again thereunto 2. In respect of the manner of their having it they have it as they have Christ himself who is their life the ground foundation authour and the fountain of it Col. 3.3 4. and so only in receiving abiding in and enjoyment of him and so 1. They have it here in a sense not in the fulness and perfection of the fruition of it for we are not capable of having it so now and here while we have not Christ in Person with us but they have it now 1. In Christ the Heir of it and the root and spring of it that eternal life that was with the Father and was manifested to us 1 Joh. 1.2 5.11 12 13. as they have him theirs and have union with and interest in him through whom also they have it 2. In a first fruits of the Spirit and of the Life that is in and by it and so in a begun life or happy state of forgiveness acceptance spiritual quickning c as before said 3. In the promise of the whole even of the full fruition of it to be had hereafter God and Christ have given it them in his Will and Testament so as in believing on the Son of Man they are made Heirs of it Tit 1.2 3.7 1 Joh. 2.25 This is the promise that he hath promised us even eternal life 1 Joh. 2.25 See also Gal. 3.29 And so they have it 4. In the hope of it Tit. 1.2 1 Pet. 1 3 4. 2. In the state to come they shall have it 1. Upon their dissolution and going to Christ in their spirits more fully resting in and with Christ and being blessed Phil. 1.21.23 Rev. 14.13 2. Upon their Resurrection in the full perfect and perpetual possession and fruition of it for ever Mark 10.30 A portion infinitely desirable and worthy the looking after and yet this is the portion of every one that believeth on the Son of Man without exception No respect of persons no difference of stronger or weaker believer as to the future enjoyment or present right to and interest in it by and through Jesus Christ There is neither Male nor Female Jew nor Greek Circumcision nor Uncircumcision bond or free but all are one in Christ Jesus and if Christs then Abrahams Seed and Heirs according to promise Gal. 3.28 29. And yet in the rewards to be received in the Davidical Kingdom or the thousand years reign at the coming of Christ and before he deliver up the Kingdom to God the Father and God be all in all there will doubtless be different degrees of Glory and Honour conferred according to mens different works services faithfulness and fruitfulness in their services and greatness of their sufferings for him as is hinted in those parabolical passages Be thou Ruler over ten Cities be thou Ruler over five Luc. 19.17 19. otherwise it would be all one to serve Christ little or much here to be abundant or sparing in the work of the Lord contrary to that of the Apostle He that soweth liberally shall reap liberally and he that soweth sparingly shall reap sparingly 2 Cor. 9.6 Though yet a shorter work more singly done may have equal reward with a larger not so singly done as the Parable of the Labourers in the Vineyard Mat. 20. may seem to import Wherefore Let us be always stedfast unmoveable always abounding in the works of the Lord knowing that our labour shall not be in vain in the Lord Rev. 20.6 with 5.10 1 Cor. 6.2 3. with 15 24 28.58 CHAP. XV. The application of the two former viz. the fourth and fifth Observations in part in exhortation to believe reproof for not believing incouragements to continue in believing on the Son of Man and some directions thereto THE consideration of the two last mentioned observations shewing the necessity and advantage of believing on the Son of Man as also the nature of this believing is and may be very useful upon diverse accounts As to Use 1. Exhort and press all men to believe on the Son of Man the Lord Jesus Christ as declared and set forth unto them in and by the discoveries teaching and operation of God and his Spirit vouchsafed to them And that they may believe on him to listen to mind and embrace and hold fast the Faith or Doctrine of him in which is the power spirit and hand of the Lord moving and enabling to believe yea begetting in the heart this faith that is so necessary and profitable for men For
or Turned away from but it is to be accepted willingly and discharged faithfully and diligently in Eye to and confidence in Gods Greatness and Goodness to uphold and bless in it and reward for it 2. But much more are they faulty who abuse the Gospel And so they do who 1. Corrupt or Pervert it as the Apostle speaks Gal. 1.7 Making it another thing then what it is in it self and from God like Wine mixed with Water Or Silver become dross Isa 1.22 Or Meat mixed with Poyson while the Name of God and the Son of man is neglected waved or laid by and Dreams and Fancies instead thereof Preached The Grace of God in its Freeness Fulness and Extent not held forth but a Mingle-mangle or Hotch-potch of Grace and Works Christ and Moses or some other Name or Doctrine in stead thereof declared such as puts men upon waiting for and expecting some Almighty and irresistable Operation and Force of Spirit to Convert and Assure them But in the mean time the Gospel of Christ which is the Power of God to Salvation to them that believe Waved and Rejected by them and Preached against even the Love of God to the World and so the Discovery of the Son of man and the Grace in him for sinners and for all men in which the Power and Spirit of God breaths and the Saving and Enlivening force is offered Men are taught to neglect that and the Power and Force working in it to look for another greater til by Stifling and Crucifying that they perish Like the Jews that rejected Jesus and the Grace discovered in and by him to look for another Messias of far more Pomp and Splendour then he Or as if some should have Taught the Wounded Israelites to have looked for some immediate Power beside the Serpent instead of looking to the Serpent through which God puts forth his Almighty Power for their Healing They who so do are to be avoided as poysoners of Souls in stead of good and skilful Physicians Or as the Corrupters of the Fountains and Springs of all true Piety and acceptable Devotion to God Tit. 3.3 4. Yea such as bring not this Doctrine of Christ we are not to receive to House or bid God-speed to for they are evil and deceitful Workers Messengers of Satan and Instruments or Authours rather of Perdition bringing in Heresies of Damnation Especially such as deny the Person and personal Works of Christ and turn them into Allegories their Doctrine is the Poyson of Dragons and the cruel Poyson of Asps quite contrary to the Doctrine of Christ Crucified the sincere Lifting up of the Son of man and therefore they that bid such God-speed or shew them any countenance and wish them success are therein partakers of their evil works Against these we may see what Woes are thundred in 2 Pet. 2. and Jude 4.19 And that For them and those after to be mentioned under this Head is reserved the blackness of Darkness for ever That is the saddest portion in Hell and Misery For these are like the evil fallen Angels especially if having known the Way of Truths they turn aside to be of these fallen from Heaven and become Seducers of men from the Way of Truth and Righteousness Causers and Provokers of others mens destructions the Instruments or Messengers of Satan to keep or delude men from Christ Jesus the Son of man that they by neglecting or putting away from them him his Salvation set forth in the Gospel and by looking to or for other false Medicines might die of their Wounds Yea by these Satan insinuates his strong delusions that men might believe Lies and be damned so that they are most Diametrically or Point-blanck opposite to Gods Grand design and mens great Good and Happiness And therefore as Christ and his Apostles were earnest and frequent in warning of such as these so there are none that the holy Prophets and Apostles speak more terribly against as shewing them to be men of swifter and greater destruction then others as may appear in Jer. 23.9 c. And in those Chapters of Peter and Jude above mentioned Oh what care therefore should be taken of falling into this number And of hearing and being perverted or subverted by them Take heed what ye hear Beware of false Prophets look to your selves for many Deceivers and Antichrists are gone out into the World that turn men from Christ and his Truth his true Church and People and lead them to destruction 2. Such as Preach the Truth but walk contrary to it in Pride Wantonness Fraud Uncleanness Covetousness Voluptuous Riotous Courses or the like causing men to stumble at the Gospel and speak evil of it These therefore are Enemies to the Cross of Christ too as the former are in their Doctrine and so much the greater as they are the more specious in theit Conversation as the Pharisees were to Christ so these also under pretence of Friendship betray it like Judas and expose it to its open Enemies to be Decried and Crucified Rejected and put away even those that Preaching it Phil. 3.18 19. yet have their Bellies their Gods and mind Earthly things whose end therefore is destruction too among the forementioned both occasionally to others and finally to themselves 3. They that do hinder the Gospel and Gospel-preachers forbidding them that would and are fitted for it and sent forth with it to speak it to others that they might be saved against such wrath hath come and will come to the utmost 1 Thes 2.14 15 16. For these men are herein such as please not God but are contrary to all men or at least to the good of those men from whom through their cause it is withheld filling up the measure of their sins Whether they be 1. Such false Teachers that like the Pharisees and Lawyers of old take away the Key of Knowledg the Vision of all the Preaching of the Grace of God that brings Salvation to all men the Preaching of the Cross of Christ as seen and testified to by all the Prophets of God and by all his holy Apostles and that gives Light to all other matters of Doctrine and Practice and concerns all men as laying a good Foundation for their Faith and Repentance and all right Obedience unto God neither entring the Kingdom themselves nor suffering those that would to enter it in so Receiving and Believing the Grace of God in Christ toward them as to be renewed into a Conformity to him and Submission to his Government by it Yea shut the Kingdom of God against men while they will not have that Preached to them that should let them see their way into it and perswade them to walk in it and enter by it Mat. 23.13 Luke 11.52 Or 2. Such as exercising some power amiss do by violent and compulsive courses hinder the Preaching and Preachers thereof whether that power misexercised be Ecclesiastical or Civil and so whether they that abuse their power to
Palaces wherewith they have made him glad Psal 45.8 And we find his Spouse clothed and adorned by him and for him too in Ezek. 10 11 12 13. and in Rev. 19.7 8. But of these things I shall not speak more largely III. We have seen the perfections of man Let us a little as we may view also those of the Angels He is also called the Angel of the Covenant Angel is in English a Messenger and therefore so translated in our later Editions of the Bible in Mal. 3.1 The Angel of Gods presence that saved Israel Isa 63.9 And that redeemed Jacob out of all evil and had power of blessing Gen. 48.16 And surely He is the highest and best Messenger or Angel that was ever sent of God being his only Son Nor can we find any excellency in the Angels in which he doth not out-strip them They are said to excel in strength doing Gods commandments Psal 107.20 but they excel not nor equalize him in either They cannot uphold all things by the Word of their Power as He doth Heb. 1.3 Nor could they stand under the weight of our sins as He did 1 Pet. 2.24 Therefore they give him the preheminence and judge him only Worthy to receive the Power Riches Wisdom and Strength Honour Glory and Blessing Rev. 5.12 Nor do they Gods Commandments like or equally to him who obeyed to the death the Death of the Cross laying down his life at his Fathers commandement and delighting to do his will therein so as to bear and take away our sins by the sacrifice of himself Philip. 2.8 Joh. 10.18 Heb. 9.26 and 10.5 6. Psal 40.48 Joh. 14.31 They are also intelligent and understanding spirits great in knowledge and excellent in speech 1 Cor. 13.1 yet far short of him for God hath found folly in them saith Job 4.18 but Christ is the wisdom of God 1 Cor. 1.24 knowing his Father whom none else so knows Matth. 11.27 and grace is poured into his lips so as God hath blessed him for ever Psal 45.2 They are also great in power especially such of them as are called Principalities and Powers Eph. 1.20 21. but not equal with Christ to whom all of them are commanded to give worship He hath obtained a far more excellent name by inheritance then they as may be seen Heb. 1.5 6. to the end They are indeed Spirits but ministring Spirits to him He is the Lord that Spirit the quickning Spirit so as none of them are 2 Cor. 3.16 17. 1 Cor. 15.45 So that in him are all the perfections and more then all the perfections of Creatures Yea CHAP. XXII Secondly That in Christ are all things Answering the Needs of Fallen man all things that pertain both to Life and Godliness AGain he is and in him are all things answering the Needs of his fallen Creatures of Mankind All things pertaining to Life and Godliness and they are given us in the knowledg of him 2 Pet. 1.3 Let us view that in either Branch First All things pertaining to Life he is and are in him for us And that both as 1. Necessary to the Being and Upholding of it not only as by his Death and Sacrifice we are and this Old World for us is upholden so as that we may subsist and Live as it were from Death or the state thereof which we were Obnoxious to under a comfortable Injoyment of a natural Life and Being and have therein opportunities of seeking the Lord Psal 73.3 Acts 17.26 27. But also in reference to a Spiritual life and happy being in and from him And so whereas First It 's necessary to our so Living that we be Begotten from the Dead to live to God he is the Begetter of men thereto the everlasting Father Isa 9.6 Who Begets in his own likenes as Adam did in his but far better Children because Adam Begat none till he was fallen into Sin and Misery whereas Christ Begets as one acquit of sin and raised from Death in and unto Righteousness and Life an holy Seed a blessed off-spring Children of Light and heirs of Life everlasting Yea he is the very Seed of Regeneration as held forth in his Testimony by the holy Spirit the Immortal Seed whereof the Sons of God are Begotten the Word preached in the Gospel 1 Pet. 1.23 24 25. And as he himself is the first Begotten from the Dead so by his Resurrection from the Dead he Begets from Death and quickens to a Lively hope 1 Pet. 1.3 with Ephes 2.1 Col. 2.12 John 5.21 25. And this as to the Soul here as he will also by his powerful Voice quicken the Dead in Body to Life again at his Coming being the quickning Spirit John 5.28 29. 1 Cor. 15.45 And in both respects the Resurrection and the Life John 11.25 Yea and he gives Power to others and makes them Instruments to Beget Children to God and to bring them forth for him too as in 1 Cor. 4.15 The Apostle tells the Corinthians he was their Father for in the Gospel he had Begot them yet so as in Christ Jesus there is none can Beget Children to God but in him and his Virtue And as they are the Fruit of the travail of his Soul Isa 53.10 So in and from him others are instrumental Mothers to Travail in Birth with them also Gal. 4.19 2. The Children Born must be Nursed up and he is the prime in Nursing what he Begets and brings forth for he can no more forget them then no nor so much as a Mother her sucking Child Isa 49.14 15. He nourishes them principally though he makes his Servants Instruments of Nursing them up too with the sincere Milk of his Word which he also primarily is as more understandibly discovered to the weak in his heavenly Doctrin 1 Pet. 2.2 Isa 55.13 Heb. 5.13 Yea and he comforts his Children as one whom his Mother comforts Isa 66.13 And surely its by manifesting himself to them that he gives them comfort John 14.16 17 21. And in this Nursing up and causing to live as the living Child must have So 1. He is the Bread and Water of Life John 6.35 and 4.10.14 his Flesh meat indeed and his Blood drink indeed And as the living Child needs clothing So 2. He is the Clothing and Apparrel For he as our Righteousness put on by us in believing on him and his Virtues as adorning us is our Raiment and Ornament too Whence that So many of us as have been Baptised into Christ have put on Christ Gal. 3.27 And Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ Rom. 13.14 And he bids us Buy of him white Raiment that our Nakedness may be covered and that our shame may not appear Rev. 3.18 3. It must have harbour and Lodging And he is the Dwelling-place for his Children in all Generations Psal 90.1 Where is sweet Peace Rest and Safety Psal 4.8 and 91.1 He being a house of Stone a strong habitation to defend and save us from our Enemies Psal 31.4
134.1 2. and Maidens Prov. 9.3 Great possessions of small and great Cattel above all others Heb. 2.6 7 8. with Psal 8.7 8. Yea The Silver and Gold is his Hag. 2.8 And the peculiar delights of Kings Cant. 1.4 and 3.9 10. Yea he hath Men-singers and Women-singers Psal 68.25 And the delights of the Sins of men Eccles 2.4 5 6 7 8. c. Psal 37.4 And all these are comfortable 6. It makes much also for our comfortable Living to have all such Gifts and Offices afforded us or persons indued with and set in them Wise and Faithful to use and discharge them as we stand in need of in their Exercise And he is and affords all such useful Mercies to us as flow from such Gifts and Offices needful for us â—â— to instance First We are foolish and need Instruction and Counsel He is the Counsellor to instruct and counsel us and Counsel even the Spirit of Counsel is with and upon him that he might direct and advise us Isa 9.6 and 11.2 Prov. 8.14 And he is free to counsel us yea calls us to him to hear him and receive his Instruction and is angry with men for nothing so much is because they will not be Counselled and Ruled by him Prov. 8.22 23. and 19.20 and 1.22 24 25 26 27 28 29 c. Secondly We are full of Diseases in our Souls and Spirits full of spiritual Weaknesses and Distempers possessed with evil Spirits or humours c. And he is the great Physitian and the good One going about and doing good and healing tendering healing to and ready to heal all that are oppressed of the Devil not denying or turning away any unhealed what ever be their spiritual Distempers that come unto him will wait upon him and be his Disciples and follow his Counsels Mat. 9.12 Acts 10.38 Yea he is both the Physitian and the Physick Gods salvation and saving health Psal 67.2 The knowledg of him healeth he that abides in him sinneth not he that sinneth hath not seen him nor known him 1 John 3.6 Thirdly We are beset with Enemies and he is the Man of War the Lord of Hosts to vanquish them for us and deliver us from them Exod. 15.3 6. Who hath spoiled Principalities and Powers and by his own Arm and his own Right-hand got himself the Victory and Triumphed over them through his Cross gloriously Col. 2.15 Psal 98.1 2. Exod. 15.2 Hath overcome the world and gives us the Victory through the Faith of him John 16.33 1 John 5.3 4. Fourthly We need Comfort and such to comfort us as know our Disturbances and Troubles and how to apply comfort to us and he hath the Tongue of the Learned and knows how to speak a word in season to the weary soul Isa 50.4 5. Having through Afflictions and Temptations gained all Experience â—he is fit to Sympathize with us comfort and succour us in all our Temptations Heb. 2.17 18. and 4.15 Yea he is the great Master of the Musick that makes and tunes Instruments to sound forth Melodiously his Praises and Plays skilfully upon them to make chearful his Friends and Servants the Prophet Ezekiel was as a Song of such a one Ezek. 33.32 Fifthly We are apt to Inthral our selves and we need a Redeemer and Redemption and he is both the Redeemer of Israel Isa 54.5 And made unto us of God Redemption 1 Cor. 1.30 Buying us out from Gods displeasure and bringing us out from Bondage to Sin and Satan 1 Cor. 6.19 John 8.36 Sixthly We are Travellers and need a Conductor and Leader and God hath given him for a Leader to us Isa 55.4 Seventhly We are Souldiers and need a Captain and Commander and God hath given us him for a Commander Isa 55.4 The Author and Captain of our salvation Heb. 2.10 and 5.9 Eightly We are apt to fall out with one another and offend God and he is the Peace-maker the Peace between God and us and us with one another listning to and minding him he will Reconcile us and Unite us together Ephes 2.13 14.16 The Prince of Peace Isa 9.6 Yea the King of Righteousness and King of Peace Heb. 7.1 2. And our Mediatour and Advocate and Interceder with God when we offend him 1 Tim. 2.5 Heb. 7.25 Isa 53.12 1 John 2.2 7. There are many Services and Ministries useful and needful for the Lifes welfare and the comfortable Accomodations of men therein and such is his great Charity and Humility that Took upon himself the form of a Servant and was sound in Fashion as a man that to help us he refuses not to serve us in love setting us an Example of like Love and Humility that we also might serve one another in Love Not out of meanness of Spirit for he needs us not nor is there any more high and lofty then he Isa 57.15 But it 's his Love and great Condescention to us who Came not to be Ministred to but to Minister and to give his Life a Ransome for many Mat. 20.28 And was as one that served while his Disciples were as those that sit at Table Luke 22.27 And so 1. We are stript naked by our sins and our shame is laid open and we can of our selves get nothing but Fig-leaves to cover us and keep us warm now He not only provides us and is our clothing as we have noted but also makes them for us and puts them on us The Lord God made Coats of the skins of Beasts for Adam and his Wife and cloathed them Gen. 3.7 21. Now all things that were made were made by Christ Joh. 1.3 and therefore also those Coats for our first Parents and He hath made and must make our Garments for us and cloth us still Isa 61.10 Though he also requite us in his strength to put them on us putting off and laying aside our own raggs as he helps us Eph. 4.21 22 23. Rom. 13.13 14. 2. We need meat and he not only is it but also prepares it for us and is ready to minister it to us Wisdom hath prepared her feast she hath killed her killing she hath mingled her Wine and furnished her Table and as she useth the Ministry of her Maid-servants to call in her Guests so she also cryeth with them Pro. 9.2 3 4. And he tells his Disciples that if they watch for him and his coming he will make them to sit down to meat and he will gird himself and serve them Luc. 12.37 3. We need Habitations and Tents to dwell in and eat and drink in and he is the builder of the house for us Wisdom hath built her house she hath hewed out her Seven Pillars Prov. 9.1 And he that builds the house is more worthy honour then the house Heb. 3.3 And it s he that builds the house of God laying the foundation and bringing up the Head-stone and so finishing it Zech. 4.7 9. and 6.12 13. So that as he in the flesh was called the Carpenter so also now he disdains
And surely he in his Divine Nature or Spirit bare up the Sacrifice of his own Body and the fire of his Divine Love kindled it and made it an whole Burnt-offering unto the Lord and on him as our Altar are all our Sacrifices to be offered too Heb. 13.10.15 For as the Divine Nature in him sanctified the humane as the Altar the Sacrifice Mat. 23.19 So it 's he that is our Sanctifier 1 Cor. 1.30 And by the Faith of him are we sanctified to him Acts 26.18 Though as there the Altar could not sanctifie any unclean thing forbidden by the Law nor might it come thereon So here we may not think to offer up any sin or what is in it self sinful by retaining the corruption in it to be sanctified by Christ but that that is made clean in him and through his Word commanding or allowing it and his Spirit springing it up and then the Pollutions thereto cleaving he takes away as he himself was the spotless Lamb and Sacrifice to which was no Pollution adhering 1 Pet. 1.18 19. 8. There was a Laver appointed that the Priests might wash their hands and feet and so go to the Altar and offer the Sacrifice Exod. 30.18 and 40.7 With respect to which David said I will wash my hands in Innocency and so will I compass thine Altar O Lord Psal 26.6 And this we have in Christ who washeth his Church with the Water in the Word as the Greek reads * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ephes 5.26 Which Water what is it but that Free-grace Love and Knowledg of God therein declared 9. Yea all the things in the Tabernacle we have in him as for brevity to say in few words The Table of Shew bread whereon were the Twelve Loaves according to the number of the Children of Israel might signifie him the Bread of God for all the Israel of God John 6.35.48 And making us as Bread to God such as his Love feeds on to the rejoycing of his heart in our welfare as presented in him for by eating of him who is that Bread we also become one Bread and one Body saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 10.17 The Candle stick and its Lamps giving Light in the Tabernacle or House of God represented that Light which we have and are made to be in him Ephes 5.8 For though the Churches are compared to and represented by the Candlesticks yet they both are so as they are in him for in him it is that any are made a People and Church to God and he and the knowledg of him are the great and true Light shining in and through them John 8.12 The Altar of Gold by the Vail and the Incense burnt thereon to perfume the Services of the Tabernacle we have in him and his Mediation and Intercession in which with the Virtues of his Obedience and Sacrifice he perfumes all our Services done in the Spirit And he himself was an Offering of a sweet smelling Savour to God for us Rev. 8.2 Ephes 5.2 Yea and in him we have 10. What was in the Sanctuary or Holy of holies yea and the Vail between both which is said to be his flesh Heb. 10.20 the Ark of Gods strength wherewith he shewed forth his presence and the strength of it as in drying up Jordan throwing down the Walls of Jericho c. and in which was the Covenant of God was a Type of him the Strength and Arm of God by whom he hath shewed forth strength in overthrowing the strength of Satan and what stood against our happiness and in whom are all the Promises and Covenant of God Yea and Amen 1 Cor. 1.22.24 2 Cor. 1.20 And in a secondary sense through him the Gospel of Christ the power of God to Salvation And the Pot of Manna and Rod of Aaron we have in him for whereof were they Types but of the hidden Comforts in him and of his Rod and Sceptre flourishing and bringing forth much Fruit even his Power and Prevalency as High-priest with God in his Mediation and Blessing men in his Name He also is the Propitiatory or covering Mercy-seat for our sins through Faith in his Blood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle himself tells us Rom. 3.25 And the Cherubims of Glory over that was but a shadow of that shadow of his Protection which he affords them who dwell in his secret place who trust in the Ark and Mercy-seat his Mercy and Truth and are directed and guided by that heavenly Voice that proceeds from him that sitteth on those Cherubims of Glory Rides on the Heavens and useth the Ministry of the Angels for the Protection and Safety of his Servants as is at large expressed Psal 91.1 2 3 4 9 11 c. And now we being furnished in him with all this for our approaching to God having him to teach us the way of his Worship and him as the Person by whom we may present our Worship and that furnisheth us with all that may render our Worship orderly and acceptable What wanteth but that we may Worship God acceptably and live Godlily approaching with Boldness and Confidence by him into his Presence with true hearts and full assurance of Faith Except we shall say there are two things wanting yet viz. a God to Worship and a Spirit of Life and Power to put life and breath into us with an heart to worship him but surely in him we have these two also as follows to be seen For CHAP. XXIII That all the Perfections of God both the Father and holy Spirit are in Christ Jesus IN him are all the Perfections of God even God himself both Father and Spirit for In him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily so that in him we are compleat who is the Head of all Principality and Power He is so glorified with Gods own self that he is the Mighty God Isa 9.6 The great God and our Saviour Tit. 2.13 God over all blessed for ever Rom. 9.5 He even he also sits between or upon the Cherubims of Glory and gives forth the Answers and Commands of God and hears the Prayers and accepts the Services and Sacrifices offered up in his House and with respect to this doubtless it was that Ezekiel in his Visions saw Over the Firmament upon the heads of the living Creatures the likeness of a Throne as the appearance of a Saphire stone and upon the likeness of the Throne as the appearance of a man above it Ezek. 1.22 26. Plainly importing that the Nature of man in him is Exalted to the Throne of God and that the supreme Power and Authority above all Creatures is given to him And indeed the Cherubims and Mercy-seat were the Throne of God the Throne of Grace And he tells us himself That he is set down with the Father in his Throne having overcome all his and our Enemies in and through his Sufferings Rev. 3.21 Being herein infinitely higher then the high Priests under the Law of Moses for
helpfulness of others what is the hope of his calling what the unsearchable riches of his grace to be believed and preached by us Eph. 1.18 19. 3.8 and to that purpose say as the Psalmist Be thou exalted O Lord in thine own strength so shall we sing and praise thy power Psal 21.13 Be thou exalted O Lord in thy own glory and excellencies so shall we see and sing of them CHAP. XXIV Some Usefulness of this Doctrine by way of Exhortation and first To look to Christ as lifted up for Vs in all Cases Use 3 ANd surely all that hath been hitherto said of the lifting up of this Son of man and of the end of it may provoke and lead us Exhort 1. To look diligently to him as so lifted up that in looking to him we may be inlightned and our faces may not be ashamed as is said Psal 34.5 He being set or lifted up of God both in himself first and then to us that we might behold him and that in seeing or looking to him we might be strengthned and framed to believe on him and seeing and believing on him we might be saved and have eternal life according to the good and holy will of God Joh. 6.40 Isa 45.22 To which 1. God himself directs and commands us saying Behold my servant whom I uphold mine Elect in whom my soul delighteth I have put my holy spirit upon him c. Isa 42.1 And 2. Christ himself also calls us saying Behold me behold me to a Nation that was not called by his Name Isa 65.1 And look to me and be ye saved all the ends of the earth Isa 45.22 And 3. The holy Spirit exhorts and commands us saying All ye Inhabitants of the World and Dwellers on the Earth when He lifteth up an Ensign on the Mountains see ye and when he bloweth a Trumpet hear ye Isa 18.3 And there is great Reason for it For Motive 1. If we refuse to look to and behold him how then shall we hereafter look upon him when He comes in his glory and calls us to an account and when we must make a reckoning to Him of our doings when He shall set before us that God for our good and welfare out of his abundant grace and mercy to us gave him his only begotten Son and He himself for us and how He through his great and heavy sorrows and sufferings was exalted and lifted up for us as an Object prepared to our hands and every way sufficient able and ready to save and heal us and we after all that would not turn away our eyes from beholding vanity to look upon and consider Him such a loving and lovely Object an Object so fair and beautiful so comely and glorious both for escape and for delight for safety and life Isa 4.2 Psal 45.2 as He was and is to us How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation as was prepared before the face and answerable to the needs and wants of all People and published and lifted up to us If they that despised Moses law dyed without mercy as we noted before under two or three witnesses of how much sorer punishment shall he be counted worthy that hath trampled under foot the Son of God such and so excellent a one as we have seen before in part counted the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified a common or unholy thing and hath done despight to the spirit of grace c. Heb. 2.3 and 10.28 29. This would be now seriously considered by us As also that Motive 2. If we look to Him the benefit will be great for He will help and heal us at all turns He is of vertue and force to heal our hearts minds and consciences in all cases as it was with the Brazen Serpent what-ever were the stings and wounds received by the fiery Serpents in looking to the Serpent of Brass they were cured of them None of them were so slighty as that they had any promise of living with them without looking to that nor any so deep and dangerous but that in looking up to that they lived So is it here None so good so holy or so little sinful as that without looking to Christ they may expect to be saved and to have eternal life nor are any so bad or desperately wicked but in a hearty serious and timely looking to Christ they may be healed and live for ever Let that then move us to look to him as delivered up to Death for our offences and raised again from the Dead for our Justification glorified at the right hand of God and lifted up in the Gospel by the Holy Spirit and in the exercise of the spiritual gifts of God's Servants given them to that purpose yea in every case let us look to Him to be healed and saved by Him As for instance Case 1. Are we sensible of our sins and sinfulness and ready to despair because they are so great and manifold The way to be healed of such wounds upon our hearts and consciences the fears horrours and smarts of such stings is to turn the eye hither to the Son of man the Lord Jesus not to pore upon our selves our own unworthiness inability to satisfy Gods justice by any sorrows bewailings confessions or amendments of ours nor to set our selves as conceiting our selves able to help or heal our selves by any such courses or by any devises or contrivances of our own or others as Plaisters of our own making or others commending or giving but only to mind and look unto the perfect Law of Liberty continuing to look thereinto that we may see what He is and what He hath done and suffered for us what satisfaction He hath given to justice what Redemption He hath obtained what Peace he hath made what Pardon is Proclaimed in Him for whom He hath suffered according to the Spirits testimony in the Scriptures and to whom He proclaims and preaches Peace there-through the greatness of his love and freeness of his Grace to Man-kind c. Thus the Apostle Peter preached Christ to those who were prickt at their hearts at their hearing that they had been guilty of murthering Christ directing them to believe on Him upon that account that there was in Him remission of sins and the Holy Ghost to be given them by him and they looking to him and yielding up to what He so looked to wrought in them were comforted and healed Act. 2.37 38 41. So also in Act. 3.13 14 19 26. He proposed to others guilty of the same fault the consideration of the blessing in him the Seed of Abraham for all the Families of the Earth and that to them the Jews first God sent Jesus to bless every one of them in turning every one of them from their iniquities The like in Act. 5.30 31. And the Apostle Paul to the Jaylour ready to make away himself and inquiring in a great affrightment what he should do to be saved directed him to
what He hath done for us and to us that He is the Son of God whom we neglect and trample under foot therein that He is the Lord that bought us whom we therein deny that it 's his precious blood the blood of the Covenant by which He procured a gracious Covenant of great and precious promises to be made for us and confirmed and ratified it and the blood wherewith we are sanctified and rendred meet to have liberty and access to and acceptance with God that is therein prophaned by us that its the spirit that discovers his grace and is of his great grace sent forth to call and cleanse us that is despited by us Heb. 10.29 2 Pet. 2.1 That they are his Members who is the Christ and his Temple who hath bought us with a great price for himself that are defiled by us 1 Cor. 6.18 19 20. Case 8. Would we see the emptiness of all our own righteousness that we do or could do for our selves for making our peace with God and obtaining his favour and acceptance Behold Christ crucified as set forth in the Gospel and that declares it and that it will not profit us Isa 57.12 for if righteousness be or could have been that way obtained then Christ died in vain but that may not be supposed therefore no other righteousness could avail us but He to be our righteousness through his Death and Sacrifice no Law could give life to us none but Christ crucified for us upon which account it was that the Apostle cryed out so of the folly and bewitchedness of the Galathians who having had Jesus Christ evidently set forth among them as crucified for them yet would turn to beggerly observations to seek to be justified by them Gal. 3.1 21. with 2.21 Case 9. Would we see our duties either to God or men what 's meet to be performed by us and how short we are in answering his engagements upon us Behold the Son of man and mind the teachings of his grace bringing salvation to us obtaining by his death and sufferings all the freedome from misery and curse and all the enjoyment of the good things vouchsafed to us and what is also for the future set in hope before us yea for ever and then we shall see our selves bound to live to him that dyed for us and rose again and to offer up to God our bodies a living Sacrifice holy and acceptable and that that 's a reasonable service to him that it behoves us to enquire and take notice of his will as our lawful Lord by vertue of his Death Resurrection and Reviving again for us and that we ought to glorify him both in body and spirit as being his purchase and so to use all freedomes mercies and enjoyments with all sobriety righteousness and godliness that we may in nothing dishonour or disserve him but glorify him in all things looking after and waiting for giving diligence that we may be found worthy of the blessed hope set before us and to be revealed at his appearance Tit. 2.11 12 13. 2 Cor. 5.14 15. Rom. 12.1 2. and 14.9 1 Cor. 6.18 19 20. and the looking upon and discerning the Lords body as crucified for us and given to be the Bread of Life to us is the best way to examine our selves and discern our defects and evils and to judge our selves accordingly for them that we may not be judged by Him 1 Cor. 11.28 29 30. Case 10. Would we be quickned up in our duties and way of seeking for and serving the Lord and not faint therein or be slothful or tired out through discouragements The way is to behold and look upon the Son of man lifted up for and before us that we may cast away every weight and the sin that so easily besets us and run with patience the race set before us look to Jesus the Author and Finisher of the Faith There we may see his Example and Pattern and also both Ingagement from his Love to us as the Author and hope of both success and of an infinite recompence of reward as the Finisher of the Faith set down on the Right-hand of Majesty that may make us gird up the loyns of our minds and run with Patience and Courage hoping perfectly for the Grace to be brought in at his appearance as obedient Children c. 1 Pet. 1.3 4 10 11 12 13 14. Heb. 12.1 2. Case 11. Would we be recovered from any Relapses and Decays to our former Strength and be helped to go forward in Christ Jesus Our way is to look upon the Son of man and therein to look to him for healing Virtue Thus the Apostles sets Christ Crucified and the Grace in him before the Galatians when he was in fear of them to recover them Gal. 3.13 14 16. and 4.4 5 6. and 5.1 And so Christ sets himself before the declining Angel of the Church of Ephesus wishing him to remember call to mind look back upon what he was fallen from Remember whence thou art fallen and repent Rev. 2.4 5. And so to the Angel of the Church of Sardis Dead while he had a Name to Live he presents himself as he that hath the seven Spirits of God and so Power to Revive him and as one that holds the seven Stars in his Right-hand signifying his love to and care of his Servants and yet power to do his pleasure with them and wishes him to remember or look back upon how he had received and heard and to hold fast Rev. 3.1 2 3. And to the Angel of the Church of Laodicea grown Luke-warm and in danger to be spewed out of his mouth he presents himself as the Amen the faithful and true Witness to quicken up his zeal in minding the firmness of his Promises and truth of his Reproofs and that he is the beginning of the Creation of God to mind him of his Power and Ability to stablish him or give being as he pleases to him and after declaration of his misery sets before him and directs his Eye to behold his Riches Fulness and Freeness and to buy of him what he wanted and his Love and Patience in Rebuking Correcting and standing with patience at the door knocking and waiting for admission and his readiness to come in and Feast with men upon their hearing and opening to him And to him as to all the rest he presents his Love Power and Faithfulness to Reward them that overcome and the greatness of the Rewards he will give them to Cure or Incourage them Rev. 3.14 18 19 20 21. Case 12. Would we be directed to and quickened up in the Love of God and of one another or Charity to the World of Mankind yea or to our Enemies Our way is to behold the Son of man as lifted up for and to us for there we may see his love to God his Father laying down his Life on the Cross in obedience to him as a perfect pattern for our imitation Phil. 2.8 9. John
1 Cor. 1.17 and 2.1 2 5. 3. Now if they be reproveable that lift him not up as they ought or not at all much more then are they so who instead of lifting Him up endeavour to cast him down as is said of some Psal 62.3 4. They only consult to cast him down from his excellency they delight in lies they bless or praise with the mouth but they curse inwardly or underneath And this they do 1. Either by bringing in damnable Heresies denying the Lord that bought them and these bring upon themselves swift destruction 2 Pet. 2.1 Such as deny or confess not Christ come in the Flesh but throw him by as useless or as one gone out of the Flesh and so Preach up a God or Spirit without Him taxing deriding or blaspheming those that confess Him come in the Flesh and the so confessing or acknowledging of Him and so all expectation of any thing from or by his Person as exalted and glorified and as having received Gifts in the man as of the Seed of David the Son of man or any looking for him in Person to appear again from Heaven mocking at the faith of his coming as is said of some 2 Pet. 3.4 5. 1 Joh. 4.3 2 Joh. 7.8 2. Or by their lives and doings exposing Him to shame scorn and reproach and so denying and decrying him while by their fruitless lives and sinful demeanours and abuses of the grace of God they blemish the profession which they make of him walking in lusts of uncleanness riotous excesses rebellious against and disobediences towards Magistrates and Princes covetousness pride fraud and the like who are the enemies of the Cross of Christ while in deeds they deny him making their Bellies their Gods and minding earthly things crucifying him to themselves afresh and putting him to open shame Heb. 6.4 5 6 7. 2 Pet. 2.1 5 6 7. Jude 1.2 7 8 c. And all these with others are faulty as guilty of not lifting up Christ the Son of man though of these some make it a piece of Religion to lift up a wooden cross and carry it in Procession and follow after and look to it and some Image or Picture of him as crucified set upon or fastened to it or so lift up and look to the Bread or Host which they call the very Body it self that was crucified or rather the whole Christ yet of the true Cross of Christ and the true and right lifting him up as crucified they are ignorant yea and enemies thereto and so are all such as are here mentioned as reproved Vse 5. And here we might also before we pass to the other Branch of Persons to be reproved take notice that in all aforesaid we have a Discovery of Doctrines Spirits or Teachers here hinted to us Our Saviour bids us beware of false Prophets who come to us in Sheeps clothing but inwardly are ravening Wolves Matth. 7.15 And to take heed least any deceive us for saith he many shall come in my Name and say I am Christ and deceive many yea and that there shall come false Christs and false Prophets and shall shew great signs and wonders so as to deceive if possible the very Elect Matth. 24.4 5 24. And the Apostles have told us of a man of sin whose coming should be after the working of Sathan Yea that as we have heard that Antichrist shall come in the last times so there are many Antichrists and false Prophets come into the World 1 Joh. 2.18 and 2 Joh. 7.8 And therefore they also have warned us to take heed to our selves Now this is one good Character by which they may be known and discerned their denying or not lifting up the Son of man but exalting themselves or some other thing or person in opposition to or instead of him according as the Apostle John giving that warning to the Churches not to believe every spirit but to try the spirits whether they be of God because many false spirits are gone out into the World adds this as a Rule for discerning the false spirits or Prophets from the true Every spirit that confesseth that is acknowledgeth praiseth speaketh out Jesus Christ come in the flesh is of God He suits with and pursues Gods design who in his Doctrine and in the drift and scope of it makes it his work and business to commend and speak forth Jesus Christ come in the flesh not only God in his naked consideration as in himself and not in Christ Jesus nor only Christ as he was before the foundations of the World or as in the Word or Prophecy only but as come in the Flesh both acknowledging that he is come in the Flesh and lifting him up as so come as the only powerful sufficient Saviour Medicine and Cure of miserable Man that men might address themselves to Him and Him only as evidencing himself in his testimony and attend upon him for his help and salvation in all his ways and appointments ordered by him as come in the flesh and having their foundation in him witnessing of and leading to him as in attending to him in his Word and waiting upon Him in his Ordinances and Gifts given and appointed for the perfecting the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the Body of Christ c. But on the other hand Every spirit that confesseth not Jesus Christ come in the flesh is not of God but is that spirit of Antichrist that should come into the World that is every Doctrine and Spirit breathing therein and so every Teacher preaching any doctrine however otherwise he may appear full of spirit force zeal and efficacy in his teaching and doctrine for moving and working upon his Auditory yea though he should speak yea or walk like an Angel in his outward conversation and appearance among men yet if he bring not this Doctrine of Christ come in the Flesh if he do not confess acknowledge speak out so as to set forth glorify and lift up Jesus Christ as come in the Flesh to be the only Saviour the Great Design and Devise of God for his bringing in or reconciling men to himself as the power and wisdom of God that in which the only wise God hath shewed forth the riches of his wisdom and that in which is the greatness of his power for destroying and overthrowing the Kingdome of Sin and Sathan and delivering men from destruction and for making them wise and able to every good thing that man is not sent of God or authorized of him in his Ministry and Doctrine nor is owned of him as acted by his Spirit but inasmuch as he lays by hides and conceals owns or acknowledgeth not that great mystery He is of Antichrist and the Spirit that acts and leads him out to and in all his zeal and fervour for promoting any other way for bringing men to God laying by this design of God this Doctrine of Christ come in the Flesh is not of God
dispensing to us his grace and blessing and so remaining as a perpetual High Priest for us and Mediator of God and us through whom we are to have all our access to and dependance on God in all things but as if Christ was gone out of the Flesh or Beeing of a Man again Or else or also 6. Talk of waiting upon God or the Spirit without use of or attending to the Means and Ordinances appointed by Him and the gifts given by him for our helpfulness dissolving Jesus at it were and loosing or dividing the Spirit from the Flesh or Humanity of Christ and so from the Means and Mediums appointed in liew of the Personal Presence of his Flesh in the World the Apostles Prophets Evangelists and other Ordinances given and appointed by him Eph. 4.8 11 12 13 14 c. Or whether He 7. Mock at or deny the glorious appearance of the Person of Christ as the Son of man sitting on the right hand of God and coming in the power and glory of God with all the Angels of his might to raise the Dead in Body out of their Graves and to judge them all according to their works condemning the wicked to everlasting misery for their obstinacy in their wickedness and giving an everlasting Kingdom and glory to all that have here believed in and obeyed him for these deny him a great part of the glory given him of his Father and so do not lift Him up but cast him down from his excellency Act. 10.42 and 17.30 31. Matth. 26.64 Luc. 22.69 c. Take we heed of all these Principles and Spirits as erring and not lifting up the Son of man and therefore not of Gods sending and owning CHAP. XXVII The second Branch of the use of Reproof viz. Of those who look not to Christ as lifted up of God his Spirit and Servants Use 6 Reproof 2 ANd as they are worthy of Reprehension and Reproof who lift not up the Son of man in their Doctrine or make not that their great design in order to the glorifying of God and doing good to others What ever or who ever else they lift up yea though they lift up as some do humane Virtues yea or Gods Gifts and Graces which are lift up out of their places when men lift them up neglecting him the right Spring of all truly good Works and the Author and Infuser of all real and right Virtues as discovered to and looked to by us So again many are greatly faulty too in not looking to and believing on him when lifted up as he is rightly lifted up in the Scriptures And indeed as the former sort are reproveable exceedingly as dishonouring God and Christ abrogating Gods Grace and obscuring Christs Glory so as men may not clearly see it and so are also very injurious and destructive to men hindring them of what is prepared of God for their Welfare and Happiness as was noted before And thereby also procure a woe and curse against themselves for how shall they escape the damnation of Hell who stand so cross and opposite to God in his grand Design and to Christ in the Honour due to him and to his Name and to the good of all men if they repent not Surely wrath is likely to and without Repentance will come upon them to the utmost 1 Thes 2.16 So also are they enemies to their own good and go contrary to Gods Ordinance Will and Command and by their evil examples are also at least prejudicial and injurious to others who when he is rightly lifted up of God and of his Spirit and his holy Apostles and Prophets as all their liftings of him up are right and by his Servants Ministers and Disciples yet refuse to behold and look to him and to seek their help and healing in and by him But either First Neglect him looking after and upon other things As the World and Flesh going in their hearts after their Covetousness their Oxen Farms Wives that I say not worse things as Hawks Hounds Whores Wine and Belly-chear Sports Pastimes c. like those in Mat. 22.5 6. Luke 14.19 20 21. and as those that look to their gain from their quarters neither sensible of their Wounds nor seeking to be healed of them they look rather on the Wine when its red or on Women or the Wedg of Gold c. Prov. 6.25 and 23.5.31 Josh 7. Or Secondly In case they be sensible that they be as it were bitten and punished for their sins If Afflictions Dangers Fears Poverty Pains or the like come upon them yet they look not to the Son of man for help or healing They turn not to him that smites them neither seek the Lord of Hosts but look to other things as their Policies and Contrivances for themselves saying In the pride and stoutness of their hearts the Bricks are fallen down but we will build with hewen stones The Sycamore Trees are cut down but we will build with Cedars Isa 9.10 13. Or else looking to those that smite them as instruments of their troubles thinking by complying with them and getting their favour and friendship and making them on their side shall be safe saying A confederacy to them that say a confederacy and staying upon them Isa 8.12 and 10.20 Or else looking to Humane helps and Carnal ways of defence and safety as when God brought War upon and discovered the Covering of Judah the weakness and nakedness of their Covering or else that Covering of his Spirit wherewith they should have covered themselves Isa 30.1 Even Christ as held forth to them in the Law and Prophets the true Propitiatory or covering Mercy-seat Rom. 3.25 then they not looking to that true Covering looked to the Armour of the house of the Forest and and saw the breaches of the City of David that they were many and gathered together the Waters of the lower Pool and numbred the houses and made a Ditch c. Such like Humane courses for safety they took But they looked not to the Maker thereof nor had respect to him that Fashioned it long ago looked not to the Lord the Maker Advancer and Blesser of their City nor to him that Fashioned it or made and fashioned the Covering wherewith they should have covered long ago Isa 22.8.11 Or they looked to Egypt and their Horses and Chariots Isa 30.1 2. but looked not to the holy One of Israel Isa 31.1 2 3. As men in a danger or fright that look hither and thither for help but look not to the true place for help So are men apt to look to Hills and Mountains in times of War in times of Sickness to the Physician as Asa 2 Chron. 16 12. and the like But seeing God hath set up and exalted such a one as is mighty to save the Son of man one chosen out of the People one who is one with us our Brother and Kinsman and so one compassionate of us as acquainted with our Temptations and Troubles And one that
forgetful hearer but a doer of the work shall be blessed in his doing Iam. 1.26 But that continuing therein minds me of another sort reproveable Namely Fourthly Those who having begun to look to him continue not till in beholding his Glory with open face as in a Glass they be changed into the same Image from Glory to Glory as by the Spirit of the Lord but look off from him again going away from this glorious Glass of the Gospel in which the beautiful Face of Christ and its Comliness and Glory for Escape and for Delight is represented and so forgetting what manner of men they are And so what need they have of being healed and changed yea and what manner of one he is too and so are not healed and changed as they need Whether it be that 1. They turn with Demas to embrace the present World and looking upon the Beauty and Comeliness and pleasing Form of their Injoyments Fellowships Friendships Riches Pleasures play therein the Adulterers and Adulteresses from Christ and provoking his displeasure and judgment against themselves they leave off to believe on and follow him James 4.4.7 1 John 2.15 16 17. Or 2. With the Galatians and others they turn to beggarly Rudiments thinking to make themselves perfect in the flesh after they have begun in the Spirit looking upon the fair shews which the delude dones make in the the flesh and how great in flesh and fleshly Gloryings and Rejoycings of their Zeal Devotions Orders or Attainments others are with whose false Ways they are taken and by which they are corrupted from the simplicity in Christ Like the Adulterous Woman Aholah and Aholibah complained of in Ezek. 23. who were snared and committed Adultery with the Egyptians Assyrians and Chaldeans because of their greatness of Flesh brave appearance in their Attire and lusty Looks their flesh like the flesh of Asses and their issue like the issue of Horses vers 14 15 20. And like Jerusalem who committed Whoredom with the Egyptians great of flesh when they saw them Ezek 16.26 Gal. 3.2 3. and 6.12 Or 3. As Jerusalem of old in EZek. 16.16 17 18 Looking upon themselves and their own Beauty and Comeliness received from Christ they grow proud and high-minded and slight Christ and the lowness of the Doctrine of the Cross and so of the Gospel and say they are Lords themselves Owners Possessors Self-sufficient as full as Christ is as good and able to live as He or however able to live without exercise of Faith in and dependance on him from which therefore they cease and live upon their own Receits Conceits and imagined Perfection And truely these are in a sad and dangerous state puffed up Lucifer-like in themselves and may easily fall or rather are already fallen into the fault and condemnation of the Devil and prove the greatest mischief to others to seduce and draw them away from the Simplicity in Christ to behold and dote on them and to affect a likeness to them in like conceits of Self-sufficiency in themselves and independency on Christ-crucified for Life and Salvation Even as the evil Spirits or the Serpent fallen into and by Pride made it his design and business to Tempt and Draw man after him by the like aspiring pride to effect equality with God and so into the same fault and condemnation with himself All these are here by this Doctrine of the Exaltation of Christ crucified the Son of man Lifted up Reproved and we may be all warned that we be not led away with their errour to fall with them from our own stedfastness even from Christ Jesus and the Grace in him and Doctrine of him wherein our stedfastness lieth 2 Pet. 3 17. But that we attend to grow in Grace and in the Knowledg of him even Christ Jesus to whom be Glory both now and for ever Amen Verse 18. And truly they that rightly view and discern how little Christ is Lifted up by men even by those also who pretend to befriend him and to be his Disciples and Worshippers or that are called Christians after his Name yea his Servants and Ministers and how great defects there are in their Lifting him up who think to lift up and exalt him and how few there are that look to him or continue so to do for healing may be filled with grief and sorrow of heart both for that God and his Grand Design and great grace is so much under-valued and abrogated Christ to whom we are so much directed of God and ingaged for the infinite fulness of grace and of God in him so slighted disregarded and abused His visage so marred more then any mans and his forme more then the Sons of men as is said Isa 52.14 And so many men for want of knowledge of and looking to him perishing the cause equity and inevitableness of whose destruction may be seen also in this Decree and appointment of the Father that the Son of man must be lifted up that whosoever believeth on him might not perish but have everlasting life as we shall in the next place take a little further view of CHAP. XXVIII Of the Cause and Reason Equitableness and Inevitableness of Mens destruction who shall be thereto adjudged of Christ and yet the Consolation that this Doctrine affords to Christ and his Members Use 7 HEre is also I say a Demonstration of the Reason and Cause Justness and Equitableness Certainty and Inavoidableness of Mens destruction who shall be thereto adjudged by Christ For 1. As to the reason and cause of it it appears hence to be as originally and firstly their sin against God provoking his wrath and anger against themselves in their personal sinnings against his Law and Doctrine or declared will as the original and first cause of the dying of the People in the Wilderness to whom allusion is here made was their being stung and bitten by the Serpents but against those first and original causes of destruction there is a remedy prepared of God in Christ and tendred in the Gospel and the declarations of God and his goodness leading to repentance in and through Christ as there was a Remedy in the brazen Serpent for the People there But as there the stung People then perished because they refused if any of them did so to look to that Serpent So the cause and reason here of Mens perishing is their refusing to look to Christ and to God in and through Christ and so to the grace in him for help and healing or their refusing to be healed thereby through looking off from him to other things This is now the great reason of Mens perishing the condemnation that Light is come into the World and men love darkness rather than light refusing the remedy because they love their diseases or love not the smart the remedy will put them to in order to the curing them of their diseases because their deeds be evil for every one that doth evil that goeth on and