God that when Christ had satisfied his utmost Demands that any of the punishment due to our Sins for which he satisfied should have lain upon him longer for that would have been no other than punishing without an Offence Now nothing is clearer in Scripture than that Death is a punishment inflicted upon us for Sin Rom 6 23. So says the Apostle The Wages of Sin is Death And in another place and 5 1â— By Sin Death entred into the World and Death passed upon all because all have sinned From all which it follows that as Christ taking upon him our Sins became thereby liable to Death so having satisfied for our Sins and thereby freed himself from the Guilt that he lay under by Imputation he was no longer liable unto Death which is one part of the punishment he underwent so that it could not have been agreeable to infinite Justice that Christ should have been holden of Death who by his undergoing of Death hath sustained the whole Load of God's infinite Wrath and Displeasure and fully satisfied for all those Sins that were imputed to him and therefore ought in Justice to be acquitted from all Penalties and consequentially from Death Fourthly Christ could not be holden of Death because of his Mediatorship It was impossible Christ should be holden of Death in respect of his Office of Mediatorship For having as our Mediatour undertaken the desperate Service of bringing sinfull and fallen Man to Life and Happiness he must of necessity not only dye but rise again from the dead without which his Death and whatever else he did or suffered for us would have been of no avail There are two Things requisite before any real or eternal Benefit can become ours First A meritorious purchase procuring the Thing it self for us Secondly An effectual Application of that Benefit to us The Purchase of Mercy was made by the Death of Christ by which a full Price was paid down to the Justice of God But the effectual Application of Mercy is by the Life and Resurrection of Christ Wherefore if Christ had only dyed and not risen again if he had not overcome Death within its own Empire and triumph'd over the Grave in its own Territories it would have been to his Disappointment and not at all to our Salvation The Loss of Christ's Life would not have procured Life for us unless as he laid it down with Freedom so he had again restored it with Power Our hope of Salvation otherwise would have been buried in the same Grave with himself but what he died to procure he lives to confer It was Ignorance of Christ's Resurrection from the Dead Luk. 24.16 19 20 21. that so stagger'd the two Disciples going to Emaus They tell Christ himself a sad Story of one Jesus of Nazareth that was condemned and crucified who while he lived among us by his Word and Works testified himself to be the true Messiah we little thought of his Dying and when he told us of his Death he likewise foretold us of his Resurrection the third Day and behold the third Day is already come and yet is there no Appearance of this Jesus Verily we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel but now our Hopes grow faint and languish in us for certainly there can be no Redemption for Israel by him who cannot redeem himself from Death There was nothing in the World did so much prejudice the Gospel and hinder its taking place in the Hearts of Heathens in the Primitive Times as this of the Cross and Death of Christ for believing that he was lifted up upon the Cross but not believing that he was raised up from the Dead they assented to their Natural Reason which herein taught them that it was Folly to expect Life from him who could not either preserve or restore his own It is true it was Folly thus to hope but that his Life applies what his Death deserv'd and our Salvation begun on the Cross is perfected on the Throne And therefore the Apostle tells us 1 Cor. 15.17 our Faith in a crucified Saviour and our Obedience to him is all vain if he had not risen again from the Dead For unless he had risen from the Dead he could not have acquitted us from the Guilt of Sin because he could not have been justified himself We are justified by the Righteousness of Christ as the Apostle speaks in his Epistle to the Romans Rom 4 25 which Righteousness he wrought out for us both by his perfect Obedience to the Law and by his Submission to the Punishment of the Law But yet this Righteousness could not have availed to our Justification had he not after the Fulfilling of it risen again from the Dead because he himself had not been justified much less could we have been justified by one who could not have justified himself And therefore we read 1 Tim. 3.16 Great is the Mystery of Godliness says the Apostle God manifested in the Flesh in his Incarnation justified in the Spirit by his Resurrection seen of Angels in his Ascension Had he not been raised and quickned by the Spirit that is by the glorious Power of his Divine Nature he had not been declared just nor could he have justified us For this Declaration that Christ was just was made upon the Resurrection of his Body from the Dead by which he was set free from all those Penalties due to our Sins that were imputed to him If therefore the Justification and Salvation of Sinners was a Design laid by the infinite Wisdom of God it must needs follow that it was impossible for Christ to be kept under Death because that would have obstructed their Justification and Salvation and so would have brought a Disappointment upon the infinite Wisdom of God which was impossible to be done and therefore consequentially Christ could not be holden of Death The Application of this great Truth shall be briefly in these following Inferences Use I First then If it was impossible for Christ not to have risen from the Dead it is evident then that Christ is the true Messiah For had he been an Impostor or False Prophet it would have been so far from an Impossibility that he should not have been raised that it would have been a very Impossibility for him to have risen again for neither could he have raised himself being a mere Man neither would God have raised him being a mere Impostor and Cheat. When therefore the Jews call'd for a Sign from Christ to prove him to be the true Messiah he gives them the Sign of his Resurrection in Matth. 12.38 39. Master Matth. 12.38 39. say they we would see a Sign from thee He answered and said unto them An evil and adulterous Generation seeketh after a Sign and there shall be no Sign given to it but the Sign of the Prophet Jonas For as Jonas was three Days and three Nights in the Whale's Belly so
World whose Minds were too deeply tinctur'd with contrary Notions that they look'd upon the Christian Religion as a Design rather to destroy Reason than to save the Soul accounting it a very absurd thing to believe in a crucified Saviour as being a Person weak and impotent or the future Resurrection as being a thing utterly impossible We find the Apostle to the Corinthians 1 Cor. 1.24 complaining that the Greeks who were then the great Masters of Wisdom and Learning esteemed a crucified Christ Foolishness and thought those Men little befriended by Reason that would depend for Life upon one that lost his own and venture to take off the Shamefulness of the Cross or to silence those Scoffs that were cast upon them for their Credulity who affirm the wonderful Resurrection of a dead Saviour and his glorious Triumph over Death and the Grave For this seemed to them no other than to solve an Absurdity by an Impossibility and make Reason more suspicious in that they judged the Fundamentals of Reason must be overthrown to make the Fundamentals of Christianity any way tolerable or possible Wherefore we find that even at Athens that great Concourse of Wits where all the Sect of Philosophers made their common Retreat yet when St. Paul preached to them Jesus and the Resurrection this Doctrine seem'd so absurd and foolish to them and so contrary to all Principles of right Reason that they forgot that Civility that usually is found in Men of inquisitive Spirits and brake out into open Reproaches and Revilings Act. 17.18 What will this Babler say because he preached to them Jesus and the Resurrection No doubt they wanted not very specious Arguments to urge against the Resurrection of the Body As first The Impossibility of a Recollection of the dispersed Particles of Men resolved into their Elements and scatter'd by the four Winds of Heaven though it might be very well retorted on the Epicureans who disputed with St. Paul against the Resurrection that it was not so unlikely a thing that there might be a Re-union of the scatter'd Parts of the same Man as the fortuitous Concourse of Attoms at the first Making of the World yet this Objection overbore and prevaild with Heathens that when they burnt the Bodies of Christians they cast their Ashes into the Rivers to confute their Hopes of ever being raised again from whenee they should be carried away into an unknown Ocean and there be made the Sport of Winds and Waves But what our Saviour says upon the same Occasion to the Sadduces may be said unto these Men You err Matth. 22.29 not knowing the Scriptures nor the Power of God For unless their Parts could be scatter'd beyond the reach of Omnipotency unless they could be ground so small as to scape the Knowledge and Care of God who ordereth and rangeth every Mote that plays up and down in the Sun-beams this Dispersion of the Body proves not the Impossibility of their Union because the Power and Providence of God will gather up every Dust and rally them together again into the same Place and Order as now they are Objection Another Argument against the Resurrection of the Body may be the various Changes dead Bodies undergo being first turn'd into Earth that again turn'd into Grass and Herbs that becoming Nourishment for other Men or Beasts that Nourishment again passing into their Substance making a kind of Transmigration of Bodies as Pythagoras would have there was of Souls which is very evident in the Case of Anthropomorphites and Men-Eaters who have of several parts of other Men's Bodies compounded their own And so the same Question may be demanded which the Sadduces asked our Saviour concerning the seven Brethren that married the same Woman whose Wife of the seven she should be at the Resurrection So here those Parts that belonged to so many Men to which of them belong they in the Resurrection without detriment to the rest Here the same Answer occurrs that Christ gave them Matth. 22.29 You err not knowing the Scriptures nor the Power of God who is the best Judge of Property and can resolve all those Parts by which any Nourishment hath been received by any other Creatures unto their own proper Bodies again And thus it appears these Arguments against the Resurrection of the Body amount not to prove the Impossibility of the Effect but only the Supernatural Almighty Power of the Efficient Wherefore granting the Resurrection impossible according to the Original Course of Natural Things yet when an Omnipotent Arm doth interpose which gives Laws unto it who dares to say the Creature may be brought to such a State of Dissolution as may out-reach the Dominion of the Almighty Creator Upon these Grounds it is that the Apostle urgeth Act. 26.8 why it should be thought a strange and incredible thing that God should raise the Dead and in the Text that he asserts the Resurrection of Christ And to prevent any fallacious Cavils against it he shews First Division of the Words That God raised him from the Dead and therefore it was not to be accounted a thing impossible since to God nothing could imply a Contradiction Secondly He doth not only assert the Possibility but the Impossibility of his final Continuance under the Power of Death The Grave that grasps and retains all other Mortals was not able to detain him who hath Immortality and Life dwelling in himself It was not possible he should be holden of it therefore God hath raised him up loosing the Pains of Death Whom God raised up Here is the Efficient Cause of Christ's Resurrection in the concurrent Action of the whole Trinity for all that God doth out of himself is ascribed to all the Three Persons Sometimes it is ascribed to the Father Act. 3.13 15. as the Apostle speaks The God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob the God of our Fathers hath glorified his Son Jesus whom ye delivered up and denied the Holy One and the Just desiring a Murtherer and killed the Prince of Life whom God hath raised from the Dead Sometimes it is ascribed to the Son who by the infinite Power of his Divinity raised up his Humane Nature from the Grave So our Saviour himself tells us I lay down my Life of my self Joh. 3.18 I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it up again The same may be collected of the Holy Ghost from the Words of the Apostle Rom. 8.11 If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the Dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the Dead shall also quicken your mortal Bodies by his Spirit Now if the Spirit of God can quicken our Bodies the same Spirit also can quicken the Body of Christ since it is the same Spirit that quickens both the Head and the Members Having loosed the Pains of Death In some Copies it is Having loosed the Pains of Hell which possibly gave
utterly lost to Modesty it must needs make him reflect upon himself with Shame and Blushing that certainly he is grown a strange vile Wretch a loathsom and odious Monster when all good and sober Men do thus carefully shun and avoid him Now Shame is a good step to Amendment And a Blush the first colour that Virtue takes Secondly Towards your selves You are obliged to abandon them as to reclaim them so to secure your selves For Vice is very contagious and it is unsafe to converse with those who have such Plague-Sores running upon them lest you be also infected Thus you see what this Duty of Brotherly Reproof is and how in the general it is to be performed either in Words or Actions And to these two Things are necessarily previous and antecedent First Conviction of the Fault Instruction and Conviction We ought to bring them to see their Fault before we rebuke them for it otherwise while we chide and do not inform them it will rather seem a proud design of quarrelling with them than a conscientious design of bettering them And therefore we find how artificially Nathan insinuates into David the hainousness and inhumanity of his Sin and works in him a Hatred and Detestation of that Person who was so cruel and devoid of Compassion before he comes to deal downright with him Thou art the Man And could we but skilfully convince our Brother by thus representing the odiousness of such and such Sins to which we know he is addicted possibly we might spare our selves in that which is the most ungrateful and displeasing part of this Work I mean personal Reflection and leave it to his own Conscience to reprove himself and to apply it home with Thou art the Man And Secondly We ought to watch over our Brother It is necessary that we watch over our Brother not so as to be insidious Spies upon him officiously to pry into his Actions and busily concern our selves in all he doth This pragmatical Temper is justly hateful And those who thus arrogate to themselves to be publick Censors and to inspect the Lives and Manners of others making it their whole Imployment to observe what others say or do that they may have Matter either to reprove or reproach them are a Company of intolerable busy Bodies But yet First By Caution We ought so to watch over our Brother as to give him timely Caution if we see him in any danger through Temptation or Passion and to admonish him to stand upon his guard to recollect himself and beware he be not surprized or injured by such an approaching Sin And Secondly The best season If we have observed any Miscarriages in him we are to watch the best Seasons and all the fittest Circumstances in which to remind him of it that so our Reproof may be well accepted and become effectual For he that will venture rashly to reprove without this Circumspection may do more mischief to his Brother by rebuking him than he had done to himself by offending Exasperating and imbittering his Heart against Piety for the Impertinencies at least the Indiscretions of those who profess it and provoking him to sin the more out of meer Opposition and Contradiction And I am verily perswaded and have in some Cases observed it that very many Sins owe themselves to the imprudence of those who have taken upon themselves to be Reprovers and would never have been committed if they had not indiscreetly gainsay'd it Thus we see what this Duty of reproving is and what is necessarily required thereunto But indeed Of the difficulty of Reproof which is the Second Thing It is not so hard a Matter to know what it is as it is difficult conscientiously and faithfully to practise it How few are there in the World I will not say skillful enough to do it well but zealous and conscientious enough to do it at all Do we not every day see God fearfully dishonoured observe his Name blasphemed his Laws violated his Worship denied Do you not daily see multitudes of wretched Creatures whose Crimes not onsy defie and outrage God but stab and murther their own Souls and yet who is there that hath that Zeal for God or that Charity for his Brother as to interpose and by a serious and fitting Reproof vindicate the one from Dishonour or rescue the other from Perdition There are enow that will make up a sad Mouth and whisper those things abroad it may be out of very ill Ends and Designs but where almost is the Person that will dare to maintain the Honour of God to the Face of those who boldly affront him that will dare to open their Mouths before those that will dare to open them against Heaven Certainly we can easily produce much more Reason for our Reproofs than they can for their Wickedness and it were very strange if we should not be able to beat them off from their Confidence when we have God and our own Consciences nay and theirs also to side with us Yet so it is that we are generally apt to sneak and slink away from so troublesome a Task and to let Iniquity pass uncontroul'd yea triumphant We are well content to let others sin quietly so that we may live quietly without troubling our selves with so hard and difficult a Service And that which makes it seem so difficult is First A sinful Fear and Secondly A sinful Shame that seizeth on the Spirits of Men and takes off the edg of holy Courage and Confidence that are so absolutely necessary to the performing of this Duty First Fear of displeasing should not hinder reproving for Sin Many are afraid to reprove Sin lest they should incur Displeasure weaken their secular Interest ruine their Dependencies and bring some Mischief upon themselves by exasperating the Offenders against them But these are poor low carnal Considerations Where Matter of Duty is in question it is very necessary for every Christian to be of an undaunted Courage and Resolution not to fear the Faces of Men nor to be frighted with a grim Look or a proud Huff If he will seriously perform this Duty he must remember that he is pleading for God that he is saving a Soul from Hell and therefore ought not to value their Anger nor his own Damage but to steel himself against all such mean and sordid Considerations Indeed it shews a most pitiful Spirit in us that we should be more afraid of offending them than they are of offending God Shall they be bold to sin and we not bold enough to tell them of it And yet such is the Cowardize of the Generality of Christians that they dare not appear for God or for Piety and Holiness when they see them wronged by the Impudence of boisterous Sinners but those pitiful little base carnal Respects of what they may lose or what they may suffer by it intervene and make them sit mopish and over-aw'd like Men in whose Mouths are