that were wrought by Christ and to that sight that they had of his glory in the Mount Mâ—t. 17. Aâ—â—s 1. and to his Resurrection and visible ascension into the highest heaven he alludes to the familiar conversation which the Apostles had with Christ for about three years and also to that touching when after the Resurrection Christ offered himself to the Apostles that believed not in him to touch him The truth of these things were confirmed Luk. 24. to them by three senses hearing seeing handling the latter still surer than the former and this proves Christ to be true man as his being from the beginning sets out his Deity Christ had also those natural affections passions infirmities which are proper to a body as hunger Mat. 4. 2. When he had fasted forty days and forty nights he was afterwards an hungerd All Christ's Actions are for our instruction not all for our imitation Matthew expresly makes mention of nights lest it should be thought to be such a fast as that of the Jews who fasted in the day and did eat at the evening and in the Chemnit night He would not extend his fast above the term of Moses and Elias lest he should have seemed to have appeared only and not to have been a true man he was hungry not because his fasting wrought upon him but Hilar. because God leâ—t man to his own nature It seems Christ felt no hunger till the forty days and forty nights were expired but was kept by the power of the Deity as the three children or rather Champions from feeling the heat of Dan. 3. 27. the fire Christ fasted forty days and forty nights and not longer lest he might be thought not to have a true humane body for Moses and Elias had fasted thus long before but never did any man fast longer When Christ began to be hungry the tempter came to him not when he was fasting the Devil is cunning and will take all the advantage he can upon us during the forty days and forty nights the Devil stood doubtful and durst not assault the Lord Jesus partly because of that voice he heard from heaven This is my beloved son in whom I am well Mat. 3. 17. pleased and partly because his forty days and forty nights fast did portend some great thing but now seeing Christ to be hungry he impudently assaults him Christ was not hungry all the forty days but after he was hungry to shew he was man Some think that Christ by his hunger did objectively allure Satan to tempt him that so he might overcome him as souldiers sometimes feign a running away that they may the better allure their enemies closely to pursue them that so they may cut them off either by an Ambush or by an orderly facing about so the Devil tempted Christ as man not knowing him to be God or if he did know him to be God Christ did as it were encourage his cowardly enemy that durst not set upon him as God shewing himself to be man And as Christ was hungry so Christ was thirsty John 4. 7. There came a woman of Samaria to draw water Jesus saith unto her give me to drink here you see that he that is rich 2 Cor. S. 9. Psal 104. 27. v. and Lord of all became poor for us that he might make us rich and he that gives to all the creatures their meat in due season he begs water of a poor Tankerd-bearer to refresh himself in his weariness and thirst John 19. 28. Jesus saith I thirst bleeding breeds thirsting sleeping Mat. 8. 24. he was asleep to shew the truth of the humane nature and the weakness of his Disciples faith Christ was in a fast and dead sleep for so much the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies his senses were well and fast bound as if he had no operation of life and therefore the Disciples are said to raise him as it were from the dead The same Greek word is used in many places where mention is made of the Resurrection as you may see by comparing John 2. 19. Mat 27. 52. 1 Cor. 15. 12. the Scriptures in the margent together He was asleep 1. By reason of his labour in preaching and journey he slept 2. To shew forth the truth of his humane nature some think the Devil stirred up the storm hoping thereby to drown Christ and his Disciples as he had destroyed Job 1. 18 19. Job's children in a Tempest before but though Satan had malice and will enough to do it yet he had not power yea though Christ slept in his humane nature yet was he awake in his Deity that the Disciples being in danger might cry unto him more fervently and be saved more remarkably And as Jesus slept so he was also weary John 4. 6. Now Jacob's well was there Jesus therefore being wearied with his journey sat thus on the well and it was about the sixth hour about noon in the heat of the day Christ was weary Christ took on him not only our nature but the common infirmities thereof and he is to be as seriously eyed in his humanity as in the glory of his Godhead therefore it is recorded that he was weary with his journey ere half the day was spent and that through weariness he sat thus on the well that is even as the seat offered or as weary men use to sit c. But in a word he was conceived retained so long in the Virgins womb born circumcised lived about thirty years on earth conversed all that time with men suffered died and was crucified buried rose again ascended and sat down with his body at the right hand of God and with it will come again to judg the world Now what do all these things speak out but that Christ hath a true body and who in their wits will assert that all this could be done in and upon and by an imaginary body But Secondly The several denominations that are given to Jesus Christ in Scripture do clearly evidence the verity and reality of his humane nature he is called 1. The son of the virgin Isa 7. 14. 2. Her first born son Luk. 2. 7. 3. The branch Zach. 3. 8. and 6. 12. 4. The branch of righteousness Jer 33. 15. and 23. 5. 5. A rod out of the stem of Jesse and a branch out of his roots Isa 11. 1. 6. The seed of the woman Gen. 3. 15. 7. The seed of Abraham Gen. 22. 18. 8. The fruit of David's loyns Psal 80. 36. and 132. 11. Act. 2. 30. 9. Of the seed of David according to the flesh Rom. 1. 3. 2 Sam. 7. 2. 10. The Lyon of the tribe of Judah Rev. 5. 5. 11. The seed of Jacob Gen. 28. 14. 12. The seed of Isaac Gen. 26. 4. 13. A son born to us a child given to us Isa 9. 6. 14. The son of man Mat. 8. 20. Mat. 16. 13. Rev. 1. 13. Dan. 7. 13. Joh.
should in a physical sense suffer which indeed is impossible yet these sufferings did so affect the Person that it may truly be said that God suffered and by his blood bought his people to himself for albeit the Act. 20. 28. 1 Pet. 1. 18 19 20. 1 Cor. 6. 20. cap. 7. 23. proper and formal subject of physical sufferings be only the humane Nature yet the principal subject of sufferings both in a physical and moral sense is Christs Person God and Man from the dignity whereof the worth and excellency of all sorts of sufferings the merit and the satisfactory sufficiency of the price did flow O Sirs you must seriously consider that though Christ as God in his God-head could not suffer in a physical sense yet in a moral sense he might suffer and did suffer For he being in the form of God thought it not robbery Phil. 2. 6 7 8. to be equal with God but made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of a Servant and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a Man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the Cross O! who can sum up the contradictions the railings the revilings the contempts the despisings and calumnies that Christ met with from Sinners yea from the worst of Sinners But how could so low a debasing of the Son of man or of the humane nature assumed by Christ consist with the Object 2 Majesty of the Person of the Son of God We must distinguish those things in Christ which are Answ proper to either of the two Natures from those things which are ascribed to his Person in respect of either of the Natures or both the Natures for infirmity physical suffering or mortality are proper to the humane Nature The glory of power and grace and mercy and super-excellent Majesty and such like are proper to the Diety but the sufferings of the humane Nature are so far from diminishing the glory of the divine Nature that they do manifest the same and make it appear more clearly and gloriously for by how much the humane Nature was weakned depressed and despised for our sins for our sakes by so much the more the love of Christ God and Man in one person toward man and his mercy and power and grace to man do shine in the eyes of all that judiciously do look upon him Object How could Christ indure Hell-fire without Obj. 3 grievous sins as blasphemy and despair c. I Answer That we may walk safely and without offence Answ these things must be premised First That the sorrows and sufferings of Hell be no otherwise attributed to Christ than as they may stand with the dignity and worthiness of his Person the holiness of his Nature and the performance of the office and work of our Redemption First then for the soul of Christ to suffer in the local place of Hell to remain in the darkness thereof and to be tormented with the material flames there and eternally to be damned was not for the dignity of his Person to whom for his excellency and worthiness both the place manner and time of those torments were dispensed with Secondly Final Rejection and Desperation Blasphemy and the worm of Conscience agreeth not with the holiness of his Nature Who was a Lamb without a spot and therefore we do not we dare not ascribe them to him Heb. 9. 14. 1 Pet. 1. 19. But Thirdly Destruction of body and soul which is the second death could not fall upon Christ for this were to have destroyed the work of our Redemption if he had been subject to destruction But Fourthly and lastly Blasphemy and Despair are no parts of the pains of the damned but the consequents and follow the sense of Gods wrath in a sinful Creature that is overcome by it But Christ had no sin of his own neither was he overcome of wrath and therefore he always Rev. 16. 9. 11. held fast his integrity and innocency Despair is an unavoidable Companion attending the pains of the second death as all Reprobates do experience Desperation is an utter hopelesness of any good and a certain expectation and waiting on the worst that can befall and this is the lot and portion of the damned in Hell The wretched sinner in Hell seeing the sentence passed against him Gods purpose fulfilled never to be reversed the gates of Hell made fast upon him and a great Gulf fixt Luk. 16. 26. betwixt Hell and Heaven which renders his escape impossible He now gives up all and reckons on nothing but uttermost misery Now mark this despair is not an essential part of the second death but only a consequent or at the most an effect occasioned by the sinners view of his irremediless woful condition but this neither did nor could possibly befall the Lord Jesus He was able by the power of his God-head both to suffer and to satisfie and to overcome therefore he expected a good issue and Psal 16. 9 10. Act. 2. 26 27 28 31. knew that the end should be happy and that he should not be ashamed Isa 5. 6 7. c. Though a very shallow stream would easily drown a little Child there being no hope of escape for it unless one or another should step in seasonably to prevent it Yet a man that is grown up may groundedly hope to escape out of a far more deep and dangerous place because by reason of his stature strength and skill he could wade or swim out Surely the wrath of the Almighty manifested in Hell is like the vast Ocean or some broad deep River and therefore when the sinful Sons and Daughters of Adam which are Rom. 5. 6. without strength are hurl'd into the mid'st of it they must needs lye down in their confusion as altogether hopeless of deliverance or escaping but this despair could not seize upon Jesus Christ because although his Father took Isa 63. 1 2 3. him cast him into the Sea of his wrath so that all the billows of it went over him yet being the mighty God with whom nothing is impossible he was very able to pass through that Sea of wrath and sorrow which would have drowned all the world and come safe to shore Object But when did Christ suffer Hellish Torments Obj. 4 they are inflicted after death not usually before it but Christs soul went strait after death into Paradise how else could he say to the penitent Thief This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Now to this Objection I shall give these following Answers First That Christs soul after his Passion upon the Cross did not really and locally descend into the place of the damned may be thus made evident First All the Evangelists and so Luke among the rest 1. Luk. 1. 3. intending to make an exact Narrative of the life and death of Christ hath set down at large his Passion Death
do not 4. Psal 37. 1 2. Psal 73. 21. Prov. 3. 31. Psal 9. 17. envy the prosperity and flourishing estate and condition of wicked and ungodly men for God has given it under his hand that they shall be turned into Hell The wicked shall be turned into hell and all the nations that forget God 'T was a wise saying of Marius to those that envy great men their honour let them saith he envy them their burdens I have read a story of a Roman who was by a Court-marshal condemned to die for breaking his rank to steal a bunch of Grapes and as he was going to execution some of the souldiers envied him that he had Grapes and they had none saith he do you envy me my Grapes I must pay dear for them Ah sirs do not envy wicked mens grapes do not envy their riches their honours their greatness their offices their dignities for they shall one day pay dear for these things high seats to many are uneasie and the down fall terrible How art Isa 14. 12. thou fallen from heaven O Lucifer son of the morning 't is spoken of the Chaldean Monarch who though high yet had a suddain change befel hm It is not a matter of so great joy to have been high and honourable as it is of grief anguish and vexation to be afterwards despicable and contemptible Come down and sit in the dust Babylon Isa 47. 1. was the Lady of Kingdoms but saith God sit in the dust Take the mill-stones and grind The Lord of hosts â—ers 2. â—sa 23. 9. hath purposed it to stain Heb. to pollute the pride of al glory and to bring into contempt all the honourable of the earth He shall bring down their pride together Wo to the Isa 25. 11. â—sa 28. 1. vers 3. crown of pride the crown of pride shall be trodden under feet God will bring down the Crown of pride to the dust to ashes yea to hell and therefore do not envy the Crown of pride Croesus was so puffed up with his Crown of pride with his great riches and worldly glory that he boasted himself to be the happiest man that lived But Solon told him that no man was to be accounted happy before death Croesus little regarded what Solon had said unto him until he came by miserable experience to find the uncertainty of his riches and all worldly glory which before he would not believe For when he was taken by King Cyrus and condemned to be burned and saw the fire preparing for him then he cried out O Solon Solon Cyrus asking him the cause of the outcry he answered that now he remembred what Solon had told him in his prosperity Nemo ante obitum foelix that no man was to be accounted happy before death Who can summ up those Crowns of pride that in Scripture and History God has brought down to the dust yea to the dunghil Have not some wished when they have been breathing out their last that they had never been Kings nor Queens nor Lords nor Ladies c. Where is there one of ten thousand who is advanced and thereby any thing bettered Solus Imperatorum Vespasianus â—n melius mutatus Few men believe what vexations lie under the pillows of Princes You look upon my Crown and my Purple Robes saith Artaxerxes but did you know how they were lined with thorns you would not stoop to take them up Damocles highly extolled Dionysius his condition Dionysius to convince him of his mistake provides a royal feast invites him to it commands his servants to attend him no meat no mirth no musick is wanting but withal caused a sharp sword to be hung over his head by an horse hair which made Damocles tremble and to forbear both meat and mirth Such even such saith Dionysius the Sicilian Tyrant is my life which thou deemest so pleasant and happy O sirs there is a sword of wrath which hangs over every sinners head even when he is surrounded with all the gay and gallant things of this world Outward prosperity is commonly given in wrath as you may see by comparing the Scriptures in the margin Hos 13. 11. Psal 73. Psal 78. 30 31. Prov. 1. 32. Luk. 12. 16. to the 22. Ecclâ—s 5. 12 13. together Prosperity kills and damns more than adversity The Germans have this proverb That the pavement of Hell is made of the glorious Crests of Gallants It had been infinitely better for the great men of this world that they had never been so great for their horrid abuse of God's mercy and bounty will but encrease their misery and damnation at last That Ancient hit it who said because they have tasted so liberally of God's kindness Augustine and have imployed it only against God's glory their felicity shall be short but their misery shall be endless and therefore to see the wicked prosper and flourish in this The whole Turkish Empire is nothing else but a crust cast by our Father to his dogs and it is all they are likely to have let them make them merry with it said Luther world is matter rather of pity than envy 't is all the heaven they must have These are as terrible Texts as any in the whole book of God Mat. 6. 2. Verily I say unto you they have their reward Luk. 6. 24. Wo to you that are rich for you have received your consolation James 5. 1 2 3. Go to now ye rich men weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you Your riches are corrupted and your garments are moth-eaten your gold and silver is cankred and the rust of them shall be a witness against you and shall eat your flesh as it were fire Gregory being advanced to places of great preferment professed that there was no Scripture that went so near his heart and that struck such a trembling into his spirit as that speech of Abraham to Dives Luk. 16. 25. Son remember thou in thy life time receivedst thy good things They that have their heaven here are in danger to miss it hereafter It is not God's usual way saith one to remove a deliciis ad delicias from delights Jâ—rom to delights to bestow two Heavens one here and another hereafter and doubtless hence it was that David made it his solemn prayer Deliver me from the wicked from men of the world which have their portion in this life Psal 17. 14. and whose belly thou fillest with thy hid treasure It is a very hard thing to have earth and heaven too God did not turn man out of one Paradise that he should here provide himself of another Many men with the Prodigal cry out give me the portion that belongs to me give Luk. 15. 12. me riches and give me honour and give me preferment c. and God gives them their desires but 't is with a vengeance As the Israelites had Quails to choke them and afterwards a King to
yeâ— the unprofitable servant into outer darkness Into a darkness beyond a darkness into a Dungeon beyond and beneath the prison The darkness of Hell is compared 2. Pet. 2. 4. Juâ—le verâ—â— 6. Acts 12. 10. This priâ—on was without the gate near mount â—alâ—â—ry and it was the loathsoâ—est and vilest prison of all for iâ— it the Thieves who were carried to Calvary to be executed were kep't and Christ alludeth to this prison in that Matth. 8. 12. and that Matth. 22. 13. and that Matth. 25. 30. Cast him into utter darkness Which allusion could not be understood unless there had been a dark prison without the City where was utter darkness to the darkness of those prisons which were often times out of the City By outer darkness the Holy-Ghost Would signifie to us that the wicked should be in a state most remote from all heavenly happiness and blessedness and that they should be expulsed out of the blessed presence of God who is mentium Lumâ—n It is usual among the Greeks by a comparative to set forth the superlative degree by outer darkness we are to understand the greatest darkness that is as in a place most remote from all light They shall be cast into outer darkness that is they shall be cast into the corporal and palpable darkness of the infernal prison Immediately after death Sinners Souls shall be cast into the infernal prison and in the day of judgment both their souls and their bodies shall be cast into outer darkness Darkness is no other thing than a privation of light Now Light is twofold viz. 1. Spiritual as Wisdom Grace Truth now the privation of this light is internal darkness and ignorance in the spirit and inward man 2. There is a sensible and corporal light whose privation is outer darkness and this is the darkness spoken of in the three Scriptures last cited For although there be fire in hell yet it is a dark and smoaky fire and not clear except only so as the damned may see one another for the greater encrease of their misery as some write Now I shall leave the ingenious Reader to conclude as he pleases concerning the place where Hell is desiring and hoping that he will make it the greatest business of his life to escape Hell and to get to Heaven c. Thirdly and Lastly If Jesus Christ did feel and suffer the very torments of Hell though not after a hellish manner then let me infer that certainly the Papists are greatly out they are greatly mistaken and do greatly err who boldly and confidently assert that Christs Soul in substance went really and locally into Hell Bellar. de Christ Animâ— lib. 4. cap. 10. 11 12 13 14 15 16. Teâ— 1. Vide Calvin in Instituâ— lib. 2. cap. 16. Sect. 9. Bellarmine takes a great deal of pains to make good this assertion but this great Champion of the Romish Church may easily be confuted First because that limbus patrum and Christs fetching the fathers from the skirts of Hell about which he makes so great a noise is a meer fable and not bottomed upon any solid grounds of Scripture Secondly because upon Christs dying and satisfying for our sins his soul went that very day into Paradise as Adam sinning was that very day cast out of Luke 23. 43. Gen. 3. 23 24. John 18. 30. Heb. 9. 12. 1 Thâ—s 1. 10. Eph. 4. 8. Heb. 2. 14. 15. Coloss 2. 14. 15. 'T is a plain allusion to the Roman Triumphs where the Victor ascended to the Capitol in a Chariot of State the prisoners following on foot with their hands bound behind them c. Paradise and his soul could not be in two places at once Thirdly because this descent of Christs Soul into Hell was altogether needless and to no end what need was there of it or to what end did he descend not to suffer in Hell for that was finished on the Cross not to redeem or rescue the Fathers out of Hell for the elect were never there and Redemption from Hell was wrought by Christs death as the Scriptures do clearly evidence not to triumph there over the Devils c. For Christ triumphed over them when he was on the Cross Christ in the day of his solemn inauguration into his Heavenly Kingdom triumphed over Sin Death Devils and Hell when Christ was on the Cross he made the Devils a publick spectacle of scorn and derision as Tamerlane did Bajazet the great Turk whom he shut up in an Iron Cage made like a Grate in such sort as thaâ— Turk Hist 220. â—e might on every side be seen and so carried him up and down all Asia to be scorned and derided by his own people By these few hints you may see the vanity and folly of the Papists who tell you that Christs soul in substance went really and locally into Hell I might make other inferences but let these suffice at this time Fourthly As Jesus Christ did feel and suffer the very torments of Hell though not after a hellish manner so Jesus Christ was really certainly made a curse for us Jesus Christ did in his soul and body bear that curse of the Law which by reason of transgression was due to us Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law Gala. 3. 13. being made a curse for us for it is written cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree He saith not Christ was cursed but a curse which is more it shews that the curse of all did lie upon him The death on the tree was accursed above all kinds of deaths as the Serpent was Gen. 3. 14. accursed above all the beasts of the field This Scripture Not that all that are hanged should be damned for the contrary appears in that Luke 23. 43. Neither is hanging in it self or by the law of nature or by civil law more execrable than any other death refers to Deut. 21. 33. His body shall not remain all night upon the tree but thou shalt in any wise hury him that day for he that is hanged is accursed of God The holy and wise God appointed this kind of punishment as being the most cruel and reproachful for a type of the punishment which his Son must suffer to deliver us from the curse Hanging on a tree was accounted the most shameful the most dishonourable the most odious and infamous and accursed of all kinds of death both by the Israelites and other nations because the very manner of the death did intimate that such men as were thus executed were such execrable base vile and accursed wretches that they did defile the earth with treading on it and would pollute the earth if they should die upon it and therefore were hang'd up in the air as persons not fit to converse amongst men or touch the surface of the ground any more But what should be the reason why the ceremonial Law affixed the curse to this death rather than any
let it slip out but Scripture addeth this hint too where it speaketh of the bosom as the place of secrets Prov. 17. 23. A wicked man taketh a gift out of the bosom to pervert the ways of iudgment speaking of a bribe Prov. 21. 14. A gift in secret pacifieth Anger and a reward in the bosom expiateth wrath Here is secret and bosom all one as gift and reward are one So Christ lyeth in the fathers bosom this intimateth his being conscious to all the father's secrets But Thirdly as the Attribute of God's omniscience is asscribed to Christ so the Attribute of God's omnipresence is ascribed to Christ Mat. 18. 20. where two or three are gathered together in my name there am I in the midst of them and chap. 28. ult I am with you alway even to the end of the world he is not contained in any place who was before there Prov. 8. 22. Jâ—h 1. 1. 3. was any place and did create all places by his own power whilst Christ was on earth in respect of his bodily presence he was in the bosom of his father which must be understood Jâ—â— 1. 18. 2. â—oh 3. 13. 2. Psal 139. 7 8 9 10 11. of his divine nature and person he did come down from heaven and yet remained in heaven Christ is universally present he is present at all times and all places and among all persons he is repletively every where inclusively no where Diana's Temple was burnt down when she was busie at Alexander's birth and could not be at two places together but Christ is present both in paradise and in the wilderness at the same time ubi non Greg. in Ezâ— â—â— m. 8. Aug. m diâ— c. 29. where two are sitting together and conferting about the Law there is Shâ—inah the diâ—ine Majesty among them Grâ—tiâ—â— on Mat. 18. 20. est per gratiam adest per vindictam where he is not by his gracious influence there he is by his vindictive power Empedocles could say that God is a circle whose center is every where whose circumference is no where the poor blind heathens could say thar God is the soul of the world and thus as the soul is tota in toto tota in qualibet parte so is he that his â—ye is in every corner c. To which purpose they so portraied their Goddess Minerva that which way soever one cast his eye she always beheld him But Fourthly as the attribute of God's omnipresence is ascribed to Christ so the Attribute of God's omnipotency is ascribed to Christ and this speaks out the God head of See Colâ—s 1. 16 17. Psal 102. 26. compared with Heb. 1. 8. 10. Joh. 1. 10. Christ All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth Mat 28. 18. John 5. 19. What things soever the father doth these also doth the son Phil. 3. 21. he is called by a metonymy the power of God 1 Cor. 1. 24. He is the almighty Rev. 1. 8. He made all things Joh. 1. 3. He upholds all things Heb. 1. 3. He shall change our vile body saith the Apostle that it may be like unto his glorious body according to the mighty working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3. ult Now from what has been said we may thus argue He to whom the incommunicable properties of the most high God are attributed he is the most high God but the incommunicable properties of the most high God are attributed to Christ ergo Christ is the most high God But Fifthly Christ's eternal deity coequality and consubstantiality with the father may be demonstrated from his divine works The same works which are peculiar to God are ascribed to Christ such proper and peculiar such divine and supernatural works as none but God can perform Christ did perform As 1. Election the Elect are called his Elect Mat. 24. 31. Joh. 13. 18. I know whom I have chosen Joh. 15. 16. I have chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit and that your fruit should remain vers 19. But I have chosen you out of the world therefore the world hateth you 2. Redemption 1 Thes 1. ult Gal. 3. 13. Rom. 6. 14. cap. 8. 1. Luk. 1. 68-80 O Sirs none but the great God could save us from wrath to come none but God blessed for ever could deliver us from the curse of the Law the dominion of sin the damnatory power of sin the rule of Satan and the flames of hell ah friends these enemies were too potent strong and mighty for any mere creature yea for all mere creatures to conquer and overcome none but the most high God could everlastingly secure us against such high enemies 3. Remission of sins Mat. 9. 6. The son of man hath power to forgive sins Christ here positively proves that he had power on earth to forgive sins because miraculously by a word of his mouth he causes the Palsey-man to walk so that he arose and departed to his house immediately Christ he forgives sin authoritatively Preachers forgive only declaratively as Nathan to David the Lord hath put away thine iniquity I 2 Sam. 12. 7. John 20. 23. have read of a man that could remove mountains but none but the man Christ Jesus could ever remit sin All the persons in the Trinity forgive sins yet not in the same manner The Father bestows forgivness the Son merits forgivness and the Holy Ghost seals up forgivness and applies forgivness 4. The bestowing of eternal life Joh. 10. 28. My sheep hear my voice and I give unto them eternal life Christ is the Prince and principle of life and Colos 3. 3 4 2. therefore all out of him are dead whilst they live eternal life is too great a gift for any to give but a God 5. Creation Joh. 1. 3. All things were made by him and vers 10. The world was made by him Colos 1. 16. By him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in the earth visible and invisible Now the Apostle telleth Just Mart. quoteth two Greek verses out of Pyâ—hagoras to prove there is but one God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. saith Pythagoras If any will assume to himself and say I am God except only one let him lay such a world as this is to stake and say this world is mine then I will believe him not otherwise Heb. 1. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not propter quem as Gretius would evade the Text For whom he made the worlds but peâ— quem by whom so the Apostle to put it out of all doubt putteth them together Câ—los 1. 16. All thiâ—gs were creaâ—ed by him and for him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you He that huâ—â—t all things is God Christ built all things ergo Christ is God The Argument lyeth fair and undeniable The all things that were created by Christ Paul reduceth to two heads visible and invisible but Zanchius addeth a
is the highest discovery of the Lords hatred and indignation of sin that ever was or will be 'T is true God discovered his great hatred against sin by turning Adam out of Paradise and by casting the Angels down to hell by drowning the old world and by raining hell out of heaven upon Sodom and Gomorrah and by the various and dreadful judgments that he has been a pouring forth upon the world in all ages but all this hatred is but the picture of hatred to that hatred which God manifested against sin in causing the whole curse to meet upon our crucified Lord as all streams meet in the sea 'T is true God discovers his hatred of sin by those endless easless and remediless torments that he inflicts upon Devils and damned spirits but this is no hatred to that hatred against sin which God discovered when he opened all the flood-gates of his envenom'd wrath upon his Son his own Son his only Son his Son Isa 53. 5 6. Prov. 8. 30 31. Matth. 3. ult that always pleased him his Son that never offended him Should you see a father that had but one son and he such a son in whom he always delighted and by whom he had never been provoked a son that always made it his business his work his heaven to promote Joh. 8. 49 50. the honour and glory of his father a son who was always Joh. 9. 4. most at ease when most engaged in his fathers service Joh. 4. 34. a son who counted it his meat and drink to do his father's will now should you see the father of such a son inflicting the most exquisite pains and punishments tortures and torments calamities and miseries upon this his dearest son you would readily conclude that certainly the sins the offences that have put the father upon exercising such amazing such matchless severity fury and cruelty upon his only Son are infinitly hateful odious Jer. 44. 4. Zech. 8. 17. The Rabbins to scare their Scholars from sin used to tell them that sin made God's head ache but I may say sin hath made Christs head ache and his heart ach too and and abominable to him Now if you please but to cast your eye upon the actings of God the Father towards Jesus Christ you will find that he hath inflicted more torments and greater torments upon the Son of his dearest love than all mortals ever have or could inflict upon their only sons Isai 53. 6. The Lord hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all Heb. Hath made the iniquities of us all to meet on him or to light or fall on him rather God made all the penalties and sufferings that were due to us to fall upon Jesus Christ as a man is wont to fall with all his might in a hostile manner upon his enemy God himself inflicted upon dear Jesus whatsoever was requisite to the satisfying of his Justice to the obtaining of pardon and to the saving of all his elect vers 10. It pleased the Lord to bruise him he hath put him to grief all the devils in hell nor all the men upon earth could never have bruised or put to grief our Lord Jesus if it had not pleased the Lord to bruise him and put him to grief he had never been bruised or put to grief O how should this work us to look upon sin with indignation Suppose a man should come to a Table and there should be a knife laid at his Trencher and it should be told him this is the very knife that cut the throat of your child or father if this person should use this knife as any other knife would not every one say Surely this man had but very little love to his father or his child who can use this bloody knife as any other knife So when you meet with any temptation to sin O then say This is the very knife that cut the throat of Jesus Christ that pierced his sides that was the cause of his sufferings and that made Christ to be a curse and accordingly let your hearts rise against it Ah how well doth it become Christians to look upon sin as that accursed thing that made Christ a curse and accordingly to abhorr it Oh with what detestation should a man fling away such a knife and with the like detestation should every Christian fling away his sins as Ephraim did his Idols Get you Hosea 14. 8. Isa 2. 20. cap. 30. 22. hence what have I any more to do with you Sin thou hast slain my Lord thou hast been the only cause of the death of my Saviour Let us say as David Is not this the 2 Sam. 23. 17. blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their lives so is not this the sin that poured out Christ's blood oh how should this enrage our hearts against sin because it cost Heb. 2. 10. the Captain of our salvation not the hazard but the very loss of his life God shewed Moses a tree wherewith he Exod. 15. 25. might make the bitter waters sweet but lo here is a tree wherewith ye may make the sweet waters of sin to become bitter Look upon the tree on which Christ was crucified remember his Cross and the pains he suffered thereon and the seeming sweetness that is in sin will quickly vanish when you are sollicited to sin cast your eye upon Christ's Cross remember his astonishing sufferings for sin and it will soon grow distasteful to your souls for how can that chuse but be hateful to us if we seriously consider how hurtful it was to Jesus Christ who can look upon the Cross of Christ and excuse his sin as Adam did saying The woman which thou gavest me she Gen. 3. 12. gave me of the tree and I did eat who can look upon the Cross of Christ and colour his sin as Judas did saying Hail Matth. 26. 49. Master who can look upon the Cross of Christ and deny his sin as Gehazi did saying Thy servant went no whither 2 Kings 5. 25. who can look upon the Cross of Christ and defend his sin as Jonah did saying I do well to be angry O sirs where is Jonah 4. 9. that hatred of sin that use to be in the Saints of old David could say I hate vain thoughts and I hate every false Psal 119 104 113 128. Rom. 7 15. way and Paul could say what I hate that do I. 'T is better saith one to be in hell with Christ than to be in heaven with sin O how odious was sin in the Saints eye The primitive Christians chose rather to be cast to Lyons without Ad leonem magis qnà m lemonem saith Tertullian than to be left to lusts within so great was their hatred of sin I had rather saith Anselm go to hell pure from sin than to heaven poluted with that guilt I will rather saith another leap into a Bonfire than wilfully to sin
King of Spain coming very young to the Crown some advised that seven Counsellors might be joyned to govern with him who should be men fearing God lovers lovers of Justice free from filthy lusts and such as would not take bribes To which Alphonsus replyed if you can find seven such men nay bring me but one so qualified and I will not only admit him to govern with me but shall willingly resign the Kingdom it self to him Wicked policies are ever destructive to their Authors as you may see in Pharaoh Exâ—d 1. 10 22. 2 Sam. 16. cap. 23. 23. Est 7. 10. in Achitophel in Haman c. As long as the Roman Civil Magistrates Senators and Commanders of Armies were chosen into places of honour and trust for their noble descent their prudence and valour their State did flourish and did enlarge its Dominions See Livim Deâ—â—â—â— more in one Century of years than it did in three after these places of honour came to be venal and purchased by concession For then men of no parts were for money promoted to highest dignities whereupon civil contentions were fomented factions encreased and continual bloody intestine Wars maintained by which the ancient Liberties of that State were suppressed and the last Government of it changed into an Imperial Monarchy As long as the chief officers of the Crown of France and the places of Judicature of the Realm were given by Charles the fifth surnamed the wise to men of Learning of Wisdom and Valour in recompence of their Loyalty virtue and merits that Kingdom did flourish with peace honour and prosperity and the Courts of Parliaments See the History of France of France had the honour for their Justice and equity to be the Arbitrators and Umpires of all the differences that happened in those days between the greatest Princes of Christendom But when these places of honour and trust were made venal in the reigns of Francis the second Charles the ninth and Henry the third and sold for ready money to such as gave most for them then was Justice and Equity banished and that flourishing Kingdom reduced to the brim of ruine and desolation by variety of factions and a bloody Civil War The wicked Counsel given by the Cardinal De Lorraign and the Duke of Guise his brother to Charles the ninth King of See the Massaâ—â— of Parâ—â— â—n the Inâ—eâ—tory of France France to allure all the Protestants to Paris under colour of the Marriage of Henry de Bourbon with Margaret de Valois the King's sister to have them all as in a trap for to cut their throats in their beds as they did for the greatest part proved fatal to the King to the Cardinal and the Duke For the King by the just judgment of God died shortly after by an Issue of blood which came out of his mouth ears and nostrils and could never be stopped and the Cardinal and the Duke were both slain by the Commandment of Henry the third in the Castle of Blois The barbarous policy of Philip the second See the 〈…〉 King of Spain to banish two or three hundred thousand Mores with their wives and children under colour of Religion on purpose to confiscate all their Land and to appropriate the same to his demesns was fatal to him and to all the Spanish Nation for by the just judgment of God he was eaten up of lice and the Spanish Nation never thrived since c. Were it not for exceeding the bounds of an Epistle I might shew in all the Ages of the world how destructive the wicked policies of Rulers and Governours have been to themselves and the States and Nations under them c. But from such policies God has and I hope will for ever deliver your soul Sir the best policy in the world is to know God savingly to serve him sincerely to do the work of your Generation throughly and to secure your future happiness and blessedness effectually c. Sir I do not offer you that which cost me nothing or little God best knows the pains the prayers and the Mal 1. 13 14. sâ—â—dy that the midwifing of this Treatise into the world hath cost me in the midst of tryals troubles temptations afflictions and my frequent labours in the Ministry The truths that I offer for your serious consideration in this Treatise are not such as I have formerly preached in Commonly men preach those points first that afterwards they print but not knowing how long the door of liberty may be open I have sent this Treatise into the world Eph. 5. 15 16. â—ol sâ— 4. 5. Eccl â— 9. 10. one place or another at one time or another but such as at several times the Lord has brought to hand and I hope in order to the service and saving of many many souls And should you redeem time from your many and weighty occasions and live to read it as often over as there be leaves in it I am apt to think you would never repent of your pains when you come to die and make up your account with God Sir I must and shall say because I love and honour you and would have you happy to Eternity that it is your greatest wisdom and should be your greatest care to redeem time from your worldly business to acquaint your self more and more with the great and main points of Religion to serve your God to be useful in your day and to make sure and safe work for your soul to escape hell and to get heaven Sir Thomas More one of the great wits of that day would commonly say there is a Devil called negotium business that carries more souls to hell than all the devils in hell beside Many men have so many Irons in the fire and â—uk 10. 40 41 42. When one preâ—ented Antipater King of Macedo â—ia wich a book treating of happiness his answer was on Scholazo I am not at leasure The Duke of Alva had so much to do on earth that he had â—o time to look up to heaven are cumbred about so many things that upon the matter they wholly neglect the one thing necessary though I hope better things of you The stars which have the least circuit are nearest the pole and men that are least perplexed with a croud of worldly business are commonly nearest to God Sir as you love God as you love your soul as you love Eternity as you would be found at Christ's right hand at last and as you would meet me with joy in the great day of the Lord make much conscience of redeeming time daily from your secular affairs to be with God in your closet in your family to read the Scriptures to study the Scriptures and such men's writings that are sound in the faith and that treat of the great things of the Gospel 'T is dangerous crying cras cras to morrow to morrow Mannah must be gathered in the morning the orient Pearl is generated
7. 15. 19. 21. 23. Isa 30. 22. 14. Hos 8. When the will stands upon such terms of defiance with all sin as that it will never enter into a league of friendship with any sin then is the Soul turned from every sin Thirdly In the judgments turning away from all sin by disapproving disallowing and condemning all sin Rom. 7. 15. O! saith the judgment of a Christian sin is the greatest evil in all the world 't is the only thing God abhors and that brought Jesus Christ to the Cross that damns Souls that shuts Heaven and that has laid the foundations of Hell O! It is the pricking thorn in my eye the deadly arrow in my side the two-edged-sword that hath wounded my Conscience and slain my comforts and separated between God and my Soul O! sin is that which hath hindred my prayers and imbittered my mercies and put a sting into all my crosses and therefore I can't but disapprove of it and disallow of it and condemn it to death yea to Hell from whence it came Fourthly In the purpose and resolution of the soul the soul sincerely purposing and resolving never willingly wilfully or wickedly to transgress any more Psal 17. 3. The general purpose and resolution of my heart is not to transgress though particular failings may attend me yet my resolutions and purposes are firmly set against doing evil Psal 39. 1. The true Penitent holds up his purposes and resolutions to keep off from sin and to keep close with God though he be not able in every thing and at all times to make good his purposes and resolutions c. But Fifthly In the earnest and unfeigned desires and careful endeavours of the Soul to abandon all sin to forsake all sin and to be rid of all sin Rom. 7. 22 23. You know when a prudent tender indulgent Father sees hs Child to fail and come short in that which he enjoyns him to do yet knowing that his desires and endeavours is to please him and serve him he will not be harsh rigid sowre or severe towards him but will spare him and exercise much tenderness and indulgence towards him and will God will God whose mercies reach above the Heavens and whose compassions are infinite and whose love is like himself carry it worse towards his Children then men do carry it towards theirs Surely no. God's Fatherly indulgence accepts of the will for the work Heb. 13. 18. 2 Cor. 8. 12. Certainly a sick man is not more desirous to be rid of all his Diseases nor a Prisoner to be freed from all his bolts and chains than the true Penitent is desirous to be rid of all his sins Sixthly and lastly In the common and ordinary declining shunning and avoyding of all known occasions of sin yea and all temptations provocations inducements and enticements to sin c. That royal Law 1 Thes 5. 22. Abstain from all appearance of evil is a Law that is very precious in a Penitent mans eye and commonly lyes warm upon a Penitent mans heart so that take him in his ordinary course and you shall find him very ready to shun and be shie of the very appearance of sin of the very shews and shadows of sin Job made a Covenant with his eyes Job 31. 1. and Joseph would not hearken to his bold tempting Mistriss to lye by her or to be with her Gen. 39. 10. And David when himself would not sit with Vain persons Psal 26. 3 4 5. Now a true penitential turning from all sins lyes in these six things and therefore you had need look about you for if there be any one way of wickedness wherein you walk and which you are resolved you will not forsake you are no true penitents and you will certainly lose your souls and be miserable for ever This Opinion that is now under-consideration is an opinion that will exceedingly deject many precious Christians and cause them greatly to hang down their heads especially in four days 1. In the day of common calamity 2. In the day of personal affliction 3. In the day of death 4. In the great day of account First In a day of common Calamity when the Sword is drunk with the blood of the slain or when the raging Pestilence lays thousands in heap upon heap or when Fevours Agues Gripes and other Diseases carry hundreds every week to their long homes O! now the remembrance of a mans beloved sins his bosom sins his darling sins if a Saint had any such sins will be very apt to fill his soul with fears dreads and perplexities Surely now God will meet with me now God will avenge himself on me for my beloved sins my bosom sins my darling sins O! how righteous a thing is it with God because of my beloved lusts to sweep me away by these sweeping Judgments that are abroad in the Earth On the contrary how sweet and comfortable a thing is it when in a day of common Calamity a Christian can appeal to God and appeal to Conscience that though he has many weaknesses and infirmities that hang upon him that yet he has no beloved sin no bosom sin no darling sin that either God or Conscience can charge upon him O! such a consideration as this may be as life from the dead to a gracious Christian in the midst of all the common Calamities that do's surround him and that hourly threaten him Secondly In the day of personal Affections when the smarting Rod is upon him and God writes bitter things against him when the Hand of the Almighty has toucht him in his Name Estate Relations c. O! now the remembrance of a mans beloved sins his bosom sins his darling sins if a Saint had any such sins will be as the hand writing upon the Wall Dan. 5. 5 6. that will make his counteance to be changed his thoughts to be troubled his joynts to be loosed and his knees to be dashed one against another O! now a Christian will be ready to conclude O! 't is my beloved sins my bosom sins my darling sins that has caused God to put this bitter cup into my hand and that has provokt him to give me gall and wormwood to drink Lam. 3. 19. Whereas on the contrary when a man under all his personal tryals though they are many and great yet can lift up his head and appeal to God and Conscience that though he has many sinful weaknesses and infirmities hanging upon him yet neither God nor Conscience can charge upon him any beloved sins any bosom sins any darling sins O! such a consideration as this will help a man to bare up bravely sweetly cheerfully patiently and contentedly under the heaviest hand of God as is evident in that great instance of Job who so sorely afflicted as Job and yet no beloved sin no bosom sin no darling sin being chargable upon him by God or Conscience Job 10. 7. chap. 31. 33. How bravely sweetly and Christianly do's Job bear up under
those sad changes and dreadful providences that would have broke a thousand of such mens hearts upon whom God and Conscience could charge beloved sins bosom sins darling sins But Thirdly In the day of death Death is the King of terrors as Job speaks and the terror of Kings as the Philosopher speaks Oh how terrible will this King of terrors be to that man upon whom God and Conscience can charge beloved sins bosom sins darling sins This is certain when a wicked man comes to die all the sins that ever he committed don 't so grieve him and terrifie him so sad him and sink him and raise such horrors and terrors in him and put him into such a hell on this side Hell as his beloved sins his bosom sins his darling sins and had Saints their beloved sins their bosom sins their darling sins Ah what a Hell of horror and terror would these sins raise in their souls when they come to lye upon a dying Bed But now when a Child of God shall lye upon a dying Bed and shall be able to say Lord thou knowest and Conscience thou knowest that though I have had many and great failings yet there are no beloved sins no bosom sins no darling sins that are chargeable upon me Lord thou knowest and Conscience thou knowest 1. That there is no known sin that I don't hate and abhor 2. That there is no known sin that I don't combat and conflict with 3. That there is no known sin that I don't grieve and mourn over 4. That there is no known sin that I would not presently freely willingly and heartily be rid of 5. That there is no known sin that I don 't in some weak measure endeavour in the use of holy means to be delivered from 6. That there is no known sin the effectual subduing and mortifying of which would not administer matter of the greatest joy and comfort to me Now when God and Conscience shall acquit a man upon a dying Bed of beloved sins of bosom sins of darling sins who can express the joy the comfort the peace the support that such an acquittance will fill a man with Fourthly In the day of Account the vâ—ry thoughts of which day too many is more terrible than Death it self such Christians as are Captivated under the power of this opinion viz. That the Saints have their beloved sins their bosom sins their darling sins such cannot but greatly fear and tremble to appear before the Tribunal of God O! saith such poor hearts how shall we be able to answer for beloved sins our bosom sins our darling sins as for infirmities weaknesses and follies that has attended us we can plead with God and tell him Lord when Grace has been weak Corruptions strong Temptations great and thy Spirit withdrawn and we off from our Watch we have been worsted and captivated But what shall we say as to our beloved sins our bosom sins our darling sins O these fill us with terror and horror and how shall we be able to hold up our heads before the Lord when he shall reckon with us for these sins But now when a poor Child of God thinks of the day of Account and is able through grace to say Lord though we cannot clear our selves of infirmities and many sinful weaknesses yet we can comfortably appeal in thee and our Consciences that we have no beloved sins no bosom sins no darling sins O with what comfort confidence and boldness will such poor hearts hold up their heads in the day of Account when a Christian can plead those six things before a Judgment seat that he pleaded in the third particular when he lay upon a dying Bed how will his fears vanish and how will his hopes and and hopes and heart revive and how comfortably and boldly will he stand before a Judgment-Seat But Ninethly This opinion that is now under consideration has a very great tendancy to discourage and deaden the hearts of Christians to the most noble and spiritual duties of Religion viz. 1. Praising of God 2. Delighting in God 3. Rejoycing in God 4. Admiring of God 5. Taking full content and satisfaction in God 6. Witnessing for God his Truth his Ordinances and ways 7. To self-tryal and self-examination 8. To the making of their Calling and Election sure I cannot see with what comfort confidence or courage such souls can apply themselves to the Eight duties last mentioned who lye under the power of this opinion viz. That Saints have their beloved sins their bosom sins their darling sins But now when a Christian is clear and he can clear himself as every sincere Christian can of beloved sins of bosom sins of darling sins how is he upon the advantage ground to fall in roundly with all the Eight duties last mentioned But Tenthly and lastly This opinion that is now under consideration has a very great tendency to discourage multitudes of Christians from coming to the Lords Table I would willingly know with what comfort with what confidence with what hope with what expectation of good from God or of good from the Ordinance can such Souls draw near to the Lords Table who lye under the power of this opinion or perswasion that they carry about with them their bosom sins their beloved sins their darling sins How can such souls expect that God should meet with them in the Ordinance and bless the Ordinance to them How can such souls expect that God should make that great Ordinance to be strengthening comforting refreshing establishing and enriching unto them How can such souls expect that in that Ordinance God should Seal up to them his Eternal Loves their Interest in Christ their Right to the Covenant their Title to Heaven and the Remission of their sins who bring to his Table their beloved sins their bosom sins their darling sins But now when the People of God draw near to the Table of the Lord and can appeal to God that though they have many sinful failings and infirmities hanging upon them yet they have no beloved sins no bosom sins no darling sins that they carry about with them How comfortably and confidently may they expect that God will make that great Ordinance a blessing to them and that in time all those glorious ends for which that Ordinance was appointed shall be accomplished in them and upon them Now by these ten Arguments you may see the weakness and falseness yea the dangerous nature of that opinion that many worthy men have so long Preacht Maintained and Printed to the World viz. That the Saints have their beloved sins their bosom sins their darling sins neither do I wonder that they should be so sadly out in this particular when I consider how apt men are to receive things by Tradition without bringing of things to a strict examination and when I consider what strange definitions of Faith many famous worthy men have given both in their writings and Preachings and when I consider what a
comfortably conclude that his â—aith is a true justâ—fying saving faith the faith of Gods Eâ—acâ— and such a faith as clearly evidences a gracious Estate and will certainly bring the Soul to Heaven Now in Answer to this important Question we may suppose the poor Believer is ready to experess himself thus First Upon search and sad experience I find my self a poor lost miserable and undone Creature as the Scriptures every where do evidence Ephe. 2. 1 2 5 12. Colos 2. 13. Rom. 8. 7 Luk. 19. 10. Secondly I am convinced that it is not in my self to deliver my self out of this lost miserable and forlorne Estate could I make as many Prayers as might be piled up between Heaven and Earth and weep as much blood as there is water in the Sea yet all this could not procure the pardon of one sin nor one smile from God c. Thirdly I am convinced that it is not in Angels or men to deliver me out of my lost miserable and undone condition I know provoked Justice must be satisfied Divine wrath pacified my sins pardoned my heart renewed my state changed c. or my soul can never be saved and I know it is not in Angels or Men to do any of these things for me Fourthly I find that I stand in absolute need of a Saviour to save me from wrath to come 1 Thes 1. 10. to save me from the curse of the Law Gal. 3. 10. 13. and to save me from infernal slames Isa 33. 14. so that I may well cry out with those in Act. 2. 37. Men and Brethren what shall we do And with the Jaylour Act. 16. 36. Sirs what shall I do to be saved Fifthly I see and know through grace that there is an utter impossibility of obtaining salvation by any thing or by any person but by Christ alone according to that of the Apostle Act. 4. 12. Neither is there Salvation in any other for there is no other name that is no oother person under Heaven given among men by which we must be saved I know there is no Saviour that can deliver me from eternal death and bring me to eternal life and glory but that Jesus of whom it is said that he shall save his People from their sins Luk. 1. 21. and therefore I must conclude that there is an utter impossibility of obtaining Salvation by any other person or things c. But Sixthly I see and know through grace that Jesus Christ is an All-sufficient Saviour that he is a mighty yea an Almighty Saviour a Saviour that is able to save to the utmost all them that come to him as the Scripture speaks Psal 89. 19. I have laid help upon one that is mighty Isa 63. 1. I that speak in Righteousness mighty to save Heb. 7. 25. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them I know that the Lord Jesus is mighty to save me from that Wrath and from that Curse and from that Hell and from that Damnation that is due to me by reason of my sins And that he is mighty to justifie me and mighty to pardon me and mighty to reconcile me to God the Father and mighty to bring me to glory as the Scripture do's every where testifie But Seventhly I know through grace that Jesus Christ is the only person anointed appointed fitted and furnished by the Father for that great and blessed work or office of saving Sinners souls as these Scriptures amongst others do clearly testifie Isa 61. 1 2 3 4. Luk. 4. 17. 18 19 20 21. Math. 1. 20 21. John 6. 27. Certainly were Jesus Christ never so able and mighty to save yet if he were not anointed appointed fitted and furnished by the Father for that great office of saving poor loâ—t Sinners I know no reason why I should expect Salvation by him But Eighthly I know through grace that the Lord Jesus Christ hath sufficiently satisfied as Mediatour the justice of God and pacified his wrath and fulfilled all Righteousness and procured the favour of God and the pardon of sin c. for all them that close with him that accept of him as he is offered in the Gospel of grace Gal 3. 19 20. 1 Tim. 2. 5. Heb. 8. 6. Heb. 9. 14 15. chap. 12. 24. Heb. 10. 12 14. Math. 3. 15. Rom. 8. 1 2 3 4. 33 34. chap. 5. 8 9 10. Act. 13. 39. Ninethly I find that Jesus Christ is freely offered in the Gospel to poor lost undone Sinners such as I am I find that the Ministers of the Gospel are commanded by Christ to proclaim in his Name a general pardon and to make a general offer of him to all to whom they Preach the everlasting Gospel without excluding any Mark 16. 15. And he said unto them Go ye into all the World and preach the Gospel unto every Creature and what is it to preach the Gospel unto every Creature but to say unto them as the Angels did to the Shepherds Luk. 2. 10 11. I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people for unto you is born this day in the City of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord c. Tenthly I know through grace that all sorts of Sinners are invited to come to Christ to receive Christ to accept of Christ and to close with Christ Isa 55. 1 2. Math. 11. 28 29. Joh. 7. 37. Rev. 3. 20. and chap. 22. 17. c. But Eleventhly Through grace I do in my understanding really assent to that blessed record and report that God the Father in the blessed Scriptures has given concerning Christ 1 Joh. 5. 10 11 12. The report that God the Father has made concerning the Person of Christ and concerning the Offices of Christ and concerning the work of Redemption by Christ I do really and cordially assent unto as most true and certain upon the Authority of Gods Testimony who is truth it self and cannot lye Now though this assent alone is not enough to make a saving reception of Christ yet it is in saving faith and that without which it is impossible there should be any saving faith But 12thly I can say through grace that in my judgjudgment I do approve of the Lord Jesus Christ not only as a good but as the greatest good as a universal good as a matchless good as an incomparable good as an infinit good as an eternal good and as the most sutable good in Heaven and Earth to my poor soul as these Scriptures do evidence Psal 73. 25 26. Cant. 5. 10. 45. Psal 1 2. Phil. 3. 7 8 9 10. 1 Tim. 1. 15. I know there is every thing in Christ that may suit the state case necessities and wants of my poor soul there is mercy in him to pardon me and power in him to save me and wisdom in him to counsel me and grace in him to enrich me and
when Angels Devils Men shall stand before the Lord Jesus whom God the Father hath ordained to be the Judge of Quick and Dead Act. 17. 31. Now to this great Question I Answer that the sins of the Saints the infirmities and enormities of Believers shall never be brought into the Judgment of discussion and discovery they shall never be objected against them either in their particular day of Judgment or in the great day of their Account Now this truth I shall make good by an induction of particulars thus First Our Lord Jesus Christ in His judicial proceedings in the last day which is set down clearly and largely in Math. 25. 34. to ver 42. doth only enumerate the good works they have done but takes not the least notice of the spots and blemishes of the infirmities or enormities Deut. 32. 4 5 6. Dan. 9. 24. of the weaknesses or wickednesses of his people God has sealed up the sins of his people never to be remembred or lookt upon more In the great day the book of Gods Remembrance shall be opened and publickly read that all the good things that the Saints have done for God for Christ for Saints for their own Souls for Sinners and that all the great things that they have suffered for Christ's sake and the Gospels sake may be mentioned to their everlasting praise to their eternal honour And though the choicest and chiefest Saints on Rom 7. 23 24. Gal. 5. 17. Earth have 1. Sin dwelling in them 2. Operating and working in them 3. Vexing and molesting of them being as so many Goads in their sides and Thorns in their eyes 4. Captivating and prevailing over them yet in that large Recital which shall then be read of the Saints lives Math. 25. There is not the least mention made either of sins of Omission or Commission nor the least mention made either of great sins or of small sins nor the least mention made either of sins before Conversion or after Conversion Here in this world the best of Saints have had their buts their spots their blots their specks as the fairest day hath its Clouds the finest Linnen its spots and the richest Jewels their specks but now in the judicial process of this last and universal Assizes there is not found in all the Books that shall then be opened so much as one unsavory but to blemish the Rev. 20. 12. Dan. 7. 10. Num. 23. 21. fair Characters of the Saints Surely he that sees no Iniquity in Jacob nor perverseness in Israel to impute it to them whilst they live he will never charge Iniquity or perverseness upon them in the great day Surely he who has fully satisfied his Fathers Justice for his peoples sins and who hath by his own Blood ballanced and made Isa 53. up all Reckonings and Accounts between God and their souls he will never charge upon them their faults and follies in the great day Surely he who hath spoken so much for his Saints whilst he was on Earth and who hath continually interceded for them since he went to John 17. Heb. 7. 25. Heaven he won't though he hath cause to blame them for many things speak any thing against them in the great day Surely Jesus Christ the Saints Pay-master Heb. 10. 10 12 14. Matth. 18. 24. Col. 2 14. who hath discharged their whole debt at once who hath paid down upon the nayl the ten thousand Talents which we owed and took in the Bond and nailed it to the Cross leaving no back-reckonings unpaid to bring his poor Children which are the travail of his soul afterward Isa 53. 11. into any danger from the hands of Divine Justice he will never mention the sins of his people he will never charge the sins of his people upon them in the great day Our dear Lord Jesus who is the Righteous Judg of Heaven and Earth in the great day of account He will bring in Omnia bene in his presentment all fair and well and accordingly will make Proclamation in that High-Court of Justice before God Angels Devils Saints and Sinners c. Christ will not charge his Children with the least unkindness he will not charge his Spouse with the least unfaithfulness in the great day yea he will represent them before God Angels and Men as compleat in him as all fair and spotless as without spot or wrinkle as without fault before the Throne of God as holy and Col. 2. 10. Cant. 4. 7. Ephe. 5. â—7 Rev. 14 5. unblameable and unreproveable in his sight as immaculate as the Angels themselves who kept their first Estate This honour shall have all the Saints and thus shall Christ be glorified in his Saints and admired in all 1 Thâ—s 2. 10 them that believe The greatest part of the Saints by far will have past their particular judgment long before Heb 9. 27. the general judgment and being therein acquitted and discharged from all their sins by God the Judge of the quick and dead and admitted into Heaven upon the credit 2 Tim. 4. 1. of Christs Blood Righteous satisfaction and their free and full justification It cannot be imagined that Jesus Christ in the great day will bring in any new charge against his Children when they have been cleared and absolved already Certainly when once the Saints are freely and fully Absolved from all their sins by a Divine Sentence then their sins shall never be remembred they shall never be objected against them any more For one Divine Sentence cannot cross and rescind another the Judge of all the world had long since cast all their sins behind his back and will he now set them before his face Isa 38. 17. and before the faces of all the world surely no he has long since cast all their sins into the depths of the Sea bottomless depths of everlasting Oblivion that they might Micah 7. 19. never be buoyed up any more He has not only forgiven their sins but he has also forgotten their sins And Jer. 31. 34. will he remember them and declare them in the great day surely no God has long since blotted out the transgressions Isa 43. 25. of his people This Metaphor is taken from Creditors who when they purpose never to exact a Debt will blot it out of their Books Now after that a Debt is strucken out of a Bill Bond or Book it cannot be exacted the Evidence cannot be pleaded Christ Col. 2. 14. having crost the debt-Book with the red lines of his Blood If now he should call the sins of his people to remembrance and charge them upon them he should cross the great design of his cross Upon this foundation stands the absolute impossibility that any sin that the least sin yea that the least circumstance of sin or the least aggravation of sin should be so much as mentioned by the Righteous Judge of Heaven and Earth in the process of that
judicial Tryal in the great day except it be in a way of absolution in order to the magnifying of their pardon God has long since blotted out as a thick Cloud Isa 44. 22. the transgressions of his people and as a Cloud their sins Now we know that the clouds which are driven away by the winds appear no more nor the Mist which is dryed up by the Sun appears no more other Clouds and other Mists may arise but not they which are driven away and dryed up Thus the Sins of the Saints being forgiven they shall no more return upon them they shall never more be objected against them Further The Lord saith Though your sins be as Scarlet Isa 1. 18. they shall be as white as Snow though they be red like Crimson they shall be as Wooll Pardon makes such a clear riddance of sin that it is as if it had never been the Scarlet Sinner is as white as Snow Snow newly fallen from the Skye which was never sullied The Crimson Sinner is as Wool Wool which never received the least tincture in the Dye-fat you know Scarlet and Crimson are double and deep dyes dyes in grain yet if the Cloath dyed therewith be as the Wooll before it was dyed and if it be as white as Snow what is become of those dyes are they any more is not the Cloath as if it had not been dyed at all even so though our sins by reiterating them by long lying in them have made deep impressions upon us yet by Gods discharge of them we are as if we had never committed them Again The Psalmist pronounceth him blessed whose Psal 32. 1. sin is covered A thing covered is not seen so sin forgiven is before God as not seen The same Psalmist pronounceth him blessed to whom the Lord imputeth not sin Psal 32. 2. Now a sin not imputed is as not committed The Prophet Jeremiah tells us That the Iniquity of Israel shall be sought for and there shall be none and the sins of Judah and they shall not be found Now is not that fully Jer. 50. 20. discharged which shall never be found never appear never be remembred never be mentioned Thus by the many Metaphors used in Scripture to set out forgiveness of sin pardon of sin you plainly and evidently see that Jer. 31. 34. Ezek. 18. 22. God's discharge is free and full and therefore he will never charge their sins upon them in the great day But Some may object and say that the Scripture saith that God shall bring every work into Judgment with every Eccles 12 14. secret thing whether it be good or whether it be evil How then can this be that the sins of the Saints shall not be mentioned nor charged upon them in the great day I Answer This Scripture is to be understood Respective c. with a just respect to the two great parties Matth 25 3â— 33. which are to be judged Sheep and Goats Saints and Sinners Sons and Slaves Elect and Reprobate Holy and Prophane Pious and Impious Faithful and Unfaithful that is to say all the Grace the Holiness the Godliness the Good of those that are good shall be brought into the Judgment of mercy that it may be freely graciously and nobly rewarded and all the wickedness of the Wicked shall be brought into the Judgment of Condemnation that â—t may be righteously and everlastingly punished in this great day of the Lord. All Sincerity shall be discovered and rewarded and all Hypocrisie shall be disclosed and revenged In this great day all the works of the Saints shall follow them into Heaven and in this great day all the evil works of the Wicked shall hunt and pursue them into Hell In this See Wisd 2. thâ—oughâ—uâ— and cap. 5. from the first verse to the tenth great day all the hearts thoughts secrets words ways works and walkings of Wicked men shall be discovered and laid open before all the world to their everlasting shame and sorrow to their eternal amazement and astonishment And in this great day the Lord will make mention in the years of all the world of every Prayer that the Saints have made and of every Sermon that they have heard and of every Tear that they have shed and of every Fast that they have kept and of every Sigh and Groan that ever they have fetcht and of all the good words that ever they have spoke and of all the good works that ever they have done and of all the great things that ever they have suffered Yea in this great day they shall reap the fruit of many good Services which themselves had forgot Lord when saw we Thee Hungry and fed Thee or Thirsty and give Math 25 34. 41. Thee drink or Naked and Cloathed Thee or Sick or in Prison and Visited Thee They had done many good works and forgot them but Christ records them remembers them and rewards them before all the World In this great day a bit of Bread a cup of cold Water shall not pass without a reward In this great day the Saints shall reap a plentiful and glorious crop as the Matth 10. 24. 25. â—ecles 11. 16. fruit of that good seed that for a time hath seemed to be buried and lost In this great day of the Lord the Saints shall find that Bread which long before was cast upon the waters But my Second Reason is taken from Christs vehement protestations That they shall not come into Judgment Joh. 5. 24. Verily Verily I say unto you he that heareth my Vide Aquâ—â— 87. Supâ—l est in l. 4. Sâ—â— dist 47. Word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into Condemnation but is passed from death unto life Those words shall not come into Condemnation are not rightly translated the Original is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall not come into Judgment not into Damnation as you read it in all your English Books I will not say what should put men upon this Exposition rather than a true translation of the Original word further it is very observable that no Evangelist useth this double asseveration but St. John and he never useth it Jâ—h 1. 51 ch 3. 3 11 chap. 6. 26. 32 47 53 c. but in matters of greatest weight and importance and to shew the earnestness of his Spirit and to stir us up to better attention and to put the thing asserted out of all question and beyond all contradiction as when we would put a thing for ever out of all question we do it by a double asseveration verily verily 't is so c. Thirdly Because his not bringing their sins into Judgment doth most and best agree with many pretious and glorious expressions that we find scattered as so many shining sparkling Pearls up and down in Scripture As First With those of Gods blotting out the sins of his people I even I am he that blotteth
he died chearfully and comfortably without murmuring or repining O what a wonder of love is this that Jesus Christ who is the Author of life the Fountain of life the Lord of life that he should so freely so readily so cheerfully lay down his life for us c. About four in the Afternoon he was pierced with a Spear and there issued out of his side both blood and water John 19. 34. And one of the Souldiers with a Spear pierced his side and forthwith came thereout blood and water Out of the side of Christ being now dead there issues water blood signifying that he is both our Justification Sanctification Thus was fulfilled that which was long before foretold Zach. 1â— 10. 1 Jâ—◠〈◊〉 Zach. 12 1. They shall by water and by blood Thus was there a Fountain opâ—â—ed to the house of David and the Inhabitants of Jerusalem even to all the Elect for sin and for uncleanness The Souldiers malice lived when Christ was dead The water and blood forthwith issuing out as soon as 't was pierced with a Spear did evidently shew that he was truely dead The Syriack paraphrase saith he pierced his rib that is the fifth rib where the pericardium lay It is very likely that the very Pericardium was pierced now the Pericardium is a film or skin like unto a Purse wherein is contained clear water to cool the heat of the heart The blood saith one signifies the perfect expiation of the sins of the Church and the water the daily Ambrose on Luk. â—â— washing and purging of it from the remainder of her corruption Water and blood issued on t of Christs side saith another to teach us that Christ justifieth none by his merit but such whom he sanctifieth by his Spirit Christ was pierced with a Spear and water and blood presently issued out of his side that his Enemies might not object that he rose again because he was but half dead on the Cross and being so taken down he revived to testifie the contrary truth John so seriously affirmeth the certainty of his death he being an eye-witness of the streaming out of Christs blood as he stood by Christs Cross O Gates of Heaven O Windows of Paradise O Palace of Refuge O Tower of strength O Sanctuary of the just O flourishing Bed of the Spouse of Solomon Me-thinks I see water and blood running out of his side more freshly than these golden streams which ran out of the Garden of Eden and watered the whole world But here I may not dwell c. But to shut up this particular about five which the Jews call the eleventh and the last hour of the day Christ was taken down and Buried by Joseph and Nichodemus But Thirdly As the death of Christ on the Cross was a lingring death so the death of Christ was a painful death this appears several ways First His Legs and Hands were violently racked and pulled out to the places fitted for his fastenings and then pierced through with Nails his Hands and Feet were nailed which parts being full of sinnews and therefore very tender his pains could not but be very acute and sharpe Secondly By this means he wanted the use both of his Hands and Feet and so he was forced to hang immoveable upon the Cross as being unable to turn any way for his ease and therefore he could not but be under very dolorous pains Thirdly The longer he lived the more he endured for by the weight of his body his wounds were opened and enlarged his Nerves and Veins were rent and torn asunder and his blood gushed out more and more abundantly still Now the invenomed Arrows of Gods wrath shot to his heart this was the direful Catastrophe and caused that vociferation and out-cry upon the Cross My God my God why hast thou forsaken me The Justice of God was now inflamed and heightned to its full 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 8. 32. God spared not his Son God would not abate one farthing of the debt But Fourthly He dyed by piece-meals he dyed by little and little he dyed not all at once he that dyed on the Cross was long a dying Christ was kept a great while upon the rack it was full three hours betwixt his affixion and expiration and certainly it would have been longer if he had not freely and willingly given up the Ghost I have read that Andrew the Apostle was two whole days on the Cross before he dyed and so long might Christ have been a dying if God had not supernaturally heightened the degrees of his torment Doubtless when Christ was on the Cross he felt the very pains of Hell though not locally yet equivalently But Fourthly As the death of Christ on the Cross was a painful death so the death of Christ on the Cross was a shameful death Christ was in medio positus he hung between two Thieves as if he had been the principal Malefactor Math. 27. 38. Here they placed him to make the world believe that he was the great ring-leader of such men Christ was crucified in the mid'st as the chief of Sinners that we might have place in the mid'st of Heavenly Angels the one of these Thieves went railing to Hell the Zach. 3 7. other went repenting forth right to Heaven living long in a little time If you ask me the names of these two Thieves who Q. were crucified with Christ I must answer That although the Scripture nominates them not yet some Writers give them these names Dismas and Gâ—smas Dismas the happy and Gesmas the miserable Thief according to the Poet Gesmas damnatur Dismas ad astra levatur That is When Gesmas died to Dives he was sent When Dismas died to Abraham up he went Well might the Lamp of Heaven withdraw its light and mask it self with darkness as blushing to behold the Sun of Righteousness hanging between two Thieves He shall be an Apollo to me that can tell me which was the greater The blood of the Cross or the shame of the Cross Heb. 12. 2. It was a mighty shame that Sauls Sons were 2 Sam. 21. 6. hanged on a Tree O what a shameful death was it for Christ to hang on a Tree between two notorious Thieves But Fifthly and lastly As the death of Christ was a shameful death so the death of Christ was a cursed death Cursed is every one that hangeth on a Tree The death on Deut. 21. 23. the Tree was Accursed above all kinds of death as the Serpent was Accursed above all Beasts of the field both for Gen. 3. 14. the first transgression whereof the Serpent was the instrument the Tree the occasion Since the death of any Malefactor might be a Monument of Gods Curse for sin it may be questioned why this brand is peculiarly set upon this kind of punishment that he that is hanged is Accursed of God To which I Answer that the reason of this was because this was
Wife that were taken Prisoners by Cyrus was asked among other things what Ransom he would give for his Wife he answered He would Redeem her liberty with his own life but having prevailed as they returned together every one commended Cyrus for a goodly man and Tygranes would needs know of his Wife What she thought of him Truly said she I cannot tell for I did not so much as look on him or see him whom then said he wondring did you look upon Whom should I look upon replyed she but him that would have Redeemed my liberty with his own life So every Believer should esteem nothing 1 Cor. 6. 20. Act. 20. 28. 1 Pet. 1. 18 19. Plutarch in vita Tit. Flam worth a looking on but that Jesus who hath Redeemed him with his own blood Plutarch tells us That when Titus Flaminius had freed the poor Graecians from the bondage with which they had been long ground by their oppressions and the Herald was to proclaim in their Audience the Articles of peace he had concluded for them they so pressed upon him not being half of them able to hear that he was in great danger to have lost his life in the press at last reading them a second time when they came to understand distinctly how that their case stood they so shooted for joy crying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Saviour a Saviour that they made the very Heavens ring again with their acclamations and the very Birds fall down astonisht And all that night the poor Graecians with Instruments of Musick and Songs of praise danced and sang about his Tent extolling him as a God that had delivered them But O then what infinite cause have we to exalt and cry up our dear Lord Jesus who by the Hellish sorrows that he suffered for us hath freed us from that more dreadful bondage of sin Satan and wrath that we lay under O! prize that Jesus O! exalt that Christ O! extol that Saviour who has saved you from that eternal wrath that all the Angels in Heaven and all the men on Earth could never have saved you from The name of Jesus saith one hath a thousand Chrysostom Dulce namen Christi Treasures of joy and comfort in it and is therefore used by Paul five hundred times as some have observed The name of a Saviour saith another is Hony in the Mouth and Musick in the Ears and a Jubile in the Heart Were Bernard Christ in your bosom as a flower of delight for he is a whole Paradise of delight saith one I had rather saith Justin Martyr Lâ—ther another be in Hell with Christ than in Heaven without him for Christ is the Crown of Crowns the glory of glorys and the Heaven of Heaven One saith That he Austin would willingly go thorow Hell to Christ Another saith He Bernard had rather be in his Chimny corner with Christ than in Heaven without him One cryed out I had rather have one Christ than a thousand worlds Jesus in the China tongue signifies the rising Sun and such a rising Sun was he to Julius Palmer that when all concluded that he was dead Mal. 4 2. being turned as black as a coal in the fire at last he moved his scorched lips and was heard to say Sweet Jesus It was an excellent answer of one of the Martyrs when he was offered riches and honours if he would recant Do but said he offer me somwhat that is better than my Lord Jesus Christ and you shall see what I will say to you Now O! that the Hellish sorrows and sufferings of Christ for us might raise in all our hearts such a high estemation and such a deep admiration as hath been raised in those worthies last mentioned It was a sweet prayer of him who thus prayed Lord make thy Son dear very dear exceeding dear and only dear and precious to me When ever we seriously think of the great and sore sufferings of 2. All the Hell Socinians grant is Annihilation by reason it is said they shall be destroyed vide Socinus Racoucat Crellius Bidle Richardson c. Christ it will be good to pray as he prayed But Secondly If Jesus Christ did feel and suffer the very torments of Hell though not after a Hellish manner then let me infer that certainly there is a Hell a place of torment provided and prepared for all wicked and ungodly persons Danaeus reckons up no less than nineteen several sorts of Hereticks that denyed it and are there not many erronious and deluded persons that stoutly and daily assert that there is no Hell but what men feel in their own Consciences Ah how many are there that rejoyce Jer. 11. 15. Prov. 2. 14. Isa 65. 3. 2 Thes 2. 11. Math. 25. 41. Isa 30. 33. to do evil and delight in their abominations and take pleasure in unrighteousness But could men do thus durst men do thus did they really believe that Hell was prepared and fitted for them and that the fiery Lake was but a little before them Heaven is a place where all is joyful and Hell is a place where all is doleful in Heaven there is nothing but happiness and in Hell there is nothing but heaviness nothing but endless easeless and remediless torments Did men believe this how could they go so merrily on in the way to Hell Cato once said to Caesar credo quae deniferis dicuntur falsa esse existimas I believe that thou thinkest all that is said of Hell to be false and fabulous So I may say to many in this day Surely you think that all that is spoken and written of Hell is but a story Don't you look upon the people of God to be of all men the most miserable and your selves of all men the most happy Yes O! but how can this be did you really believe that there was a Heaven for the Righteous and a Hell for the Wicked 'T is an Italian Proverb Qui venetias non vidit non credit c. He who hath not seen Venice will not believe and he who hath not lived some time there doth not understand what a City it is this in a sense is true of Hell But now for the Qâ—d sit that there is a Hell that there is such a place of misery prepared and appointed for the wicked I shall briefly demonstrate against the high Atheists and Socinians of this day and therefore thus First God Created Angels and Men after his own Image Man must be so much honoured as to be made like God and no Creature must be so much honoured as to be made like man The pattern after which man was made is somtimes called Image alonâ— So God Created Gen. 1. 27. man in his own Image in the Image of God Created he him Somtimes likeness alone In the day that God created man in the holiness of God made he him sometimes Gen. 5. 1. both Let us make man in our Image
after our likeness Gen. 1. 26. which makes a prudent Interpreter think that when they are joyned it is by Hendiadys and that the Andr. Rivet in Gen. Exer 〈…〉 Nihil est in macrocosm 〈…〉 num praeter microcosmum â—avoâ—inus There is nothing in the vast world of Creatures truly great except the little world of man Holy Ghost meaneth an Image most like his own It is exceeding much for mans honour that he is an Epitomy of the world an abridgement of other Creatures partaking with the stones in being with the Stars in motion with the Plants in growing with the Beasts in sense and with Angels in science But his being made after Gods Image is far more You know when great men erect a stately building they cause their own picture to be hung upon it that spectators may know who was the chief founder of it So when God had created the Fabrick of this world the last thing he did was the setting up his own Picture in it Creating man after his own Image When the great Creator went about that noble work that prime piece of making of man He doth as it were call a solemn Counsel of the sacred persons in the Trinity And God said Let us make Man in our Image Gen 1. 26. Man saith one in his Creation is Angelical in his Corruption Diabolical in his Renovation Theological in his Translation Majestical an Angel in Eden a Devil in the World a Saint in the Church a King in Heaven c. Man before his Fall was the best of Creatures but since his Fall he is become the worst of Creatures He that was once the Image of God the glory of Paradise the worlds Lord and the Lords darling is now become an abomination to God a burden to Heaven a Plague to the World and a slave to Satan When Man first came out of Gods Mint he did shine most gloriously as being bespangled with Holiness and clad with the royal Robe of Righteousness his Understanding was filled with knowledge his Will with uprightness his Affections with holiness c. But yet being a mutable Creature and subject to temptations Satan quickly stript him of his happiness and cheated and cousened him of his Imperial Crown as we use to do Children with an Apple If God had created Angels and men immutable he had created them Gods and not Creatures but being made mutable we know they did fall from their primitive purity and glory and we know that out of the whole Host of Angels he kept some from falling and when all mankind was fallen he Redeemed some by his Son Now mark as he shews mercy upon some in their Salvation Rom. 7. 21 22 23. so it is meet that he should glorifie his justice upon others in their Condemnation And because there must be distinct places for the exercise of the one and for the execution of the other which are in God equally infinit by an irrecoverable decree from the foundation of the world a glorious habitation was prepared for the one and a most hideous Dungeon for the other These shall go into everlasting punishment and the Righteous into Math. 25. 6. life Eternal yea so certain are both these places that they were of old prepared for that very purpose Inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world and so Depart ye Cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels Look as God foresaw vers 41. the different estates and conditions of Men and Angels so he provided for them distinct and different places Doubtless Hell was constituted before Angels or or Men fell Hell was framed before sin was hatched as Heaven was formed and fitted before any of the Inhabitants were produced But Secondly That there is a Hell both the Old and New Testament doth clearly and fully testifie take some instances Psal 9. 17. The wicked shall be turned into Hell Sheol is often put for the Grave Psal 16. 10. but not always and all the Nations that forget God in the Hebrew there are two into 's into into Hell that is The Wicked shall certainly be turned into the nethermost Hell yea they shall forcibly be turned into the lowest and darkest place in Hell God will as it were with both hands thrust him In tenebras ex tenebris infelicit ex exclusi in felicius excludendi August into Hell If Sheol here signifie the Grave only what punishment is here threatned to the Wicked which the Righteous is not equally liable to Doubtless Sheol here is to be taken for that prison or place of torment where Divine justice detayns all those in hold that have all their days rebelled against him scorned his Son despised the means of Grace and dyed in open Rebellion against him The Psalmist saith my Author declares the miserable Mollerus condition of all those who live and dye in their sins Aeternis punientur paenis They shall be everlastingly punished And Masculus reads the place thus Animi impiorum cruciatibus debitis apud inferos punientur The souls of the ungodly shall be punished in Hell with deserved torments Certainly the very place in which the wicked shall lodge and be tormented to all Eternity viz. Hell the bottomless Pit a Dungeon of darkness a Lake of fire and brimstone a fiery Furnace will extreamly aggravate the dolefulness of their condition O Sirs were all Vide Bellarm. de Eter Faelâ— the Water in the Sea Ink and every pile of Grass a Pen and every hair on all the mens heads in the world the hand of a ready Writer all would be too short graphically to delincate the nature of this Dungeon where all lost souls must lodge for ever Where is the man who to gain a world would lodge one night in a Room that 's haunted with Devils and is it nothing to dwell in Hell with them for ever So Solomon Prov. 5. 5. saith By death and Hell is in this place meant not only temporal death and the visible grave but also eternal death and hell it self even the place of the damned The Dutch Annotations of the Harlot That her feet go down to death her steps take hold on Hell here Sheol is translated Hell and in the judgment of Lavator is well translated to Foveam vel infernum passus ejus tenebunt which saith he is spoken not so much of natural death as of spiritual and that eternal destruction which followeth thereupon and he gives this for a reason why we should understand the place so Because Whordom being an abominable sin defiling the Members of the Body of Christ dissolving and making void the Covenant between God and Man must needs be accompanied with an equivalent judgment even excluding those that are guilty thereof without Repentance 1 Cor. 6. 9 10. Gal. 5. 19 20 21. Rev. 21. 27. Heb 13. 4. the Kingdom of Heaven into which pure and undefiled place no unclean
to be endured a thousand years me-thinks I could bear it but for ever that amazeth me Bellarmin out of Barocius tells us of a learned man De arte bene moâ—iendi who after his death appeared to his Friend complaining that he was adjudged to Hell-torments which saith he were they to last but a thousand thousand years I should think it tollerable but alass they are eternal The fire in Hell is like that stone in Arcadia I have read of which being once kindled could not be quenched There is no Estate on Earth so miserable but a man may be delivered out of it but out of Hell there is no deliverance It is not the prayer no not of a Gregory though never so great what ever they fable that can rescue any that is once become Hells Prisoner I might add other Scriptures out of the old Testament but let these suffice That there is such a place as Hell is prepared for the torment of the bodys souls of wicked impenitent Siners is most clear evident in the New Testament as well as in the Old Amongst the many that might be produced take these for a tast Mat. 5. 22. But I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his Brother without a cause rashly vainly and unreasonably shall be in danger of the Judgment whosoever shall say to his Brother Raca shall be in danger of the Councel but whosoever shall say thou Fool shall be in danger of Hell-fire Gr to or in the Gehenna of fire In this Scripture our Lord Jesus doth allude to the custom of punishing Offenders used among the Jews now there were three degrees of punishments that were used among the Jews First In every Town where there were a hundred and twenty Inhabitants there was a little Councel of three which judged smaller matters for which whipping or some pecuniary mulct was imposed Secondly There was a Councel consisting of three and twenty seven of these were Judges fourteen Assessors Josephus who were mostly of the Levites and to these were added two supernumeraries which made the twenty-three which the Hebrews generally say was the number that made up this second Councel Now this Councel sate in the Gates of the City and did judge of civil matters having also power of life and death Thirdly There was the great Synedrion or High-Court of Judicatory which consisted of seventy and two six chosen of every Tribe Now this Councel sate in the Court of the Temple and had all matters of greatest moment brought before them as Heresie Idolatry Apostacy Beza Somtimes they convented before them the High-Priest and somtimes false Prophets yea somtimes a whole Tribe as my Reverend Author thinks Now look as there is a gradation of sin so there is a gradation of punishment pointed at in this Scripture for the opening of which consider you have here three degrees of secret murder or of inward heart-murder And 1. The first is Rash anger Now this brings a man in danger of the Judgment By the judgment he means not the judgment of the three who judged of mony-matters but by judgment he means the Counsel of the three and twenty men Now they are called the Judgment because they judged of Murthers and inflicted death c. Now he that shall rashly vainly causelesly unseasonably be angry with his Brother he shall be liable to the punishments that are to be inflicted by the Judges Look what punishments they in the Sanhedrim inflicted upon actual and apparent Murderers the same were they liable to and did deserve at the hands of God who were guilty of this secret kind of Murther viz. Rash Anger From the different degrees of punishments among the Jews Christ would shew the degrees of punishment in another world according to the greatness of mens sins as if he should say Look as among you Jews there are different offences some are judged in your little Counsel of three and others are judged in your Counsel of three and twenty and others in your great Sanhedrim So in the high Court of Heaven some sins as Rash Anger are less punished and others are more sorely punished as when your Rash Anger shall break forth into railings c. In these words Whosoever is angry with his Brother without a cause shall be in danger of Judgment You may see that Christ gives as much to Rash Anger as the Jews did to Murther as if he should have said You Pharisees exceed all measure and bounds in your anger and with a malicious heart you rail upon the most innocent persons upon me and my Disciples but I would have you take heed of Rash Anger for you shall have greater torments in Hell for your Rash anger than those that Murderers suffer by your Counsel of three and twenty But these words he shall be in danger of Judgment do contain the reward and punishment of unlawful anger as if our Saviour had said Rash Anger shall not escape just punishment but shall be arraigned and summoned before Gods Tribunal at the dreadful day of Judgment when the angry man shall not be able to answer one word of a thousand The second kind of secret Murder is to say to our Brother 2. Whether the word Raca be Hebrew or some say as Syriack as others say or Chaldee it matters not for all agree in this that it is a word that notes scorn and contempt c. Lapide Vide Weemes on the judicial Law of Moses and Dr. Field of the Church Michael Maronita Raca that is say some O vain man others say it signifies a brainless Fellow and the learned Tremellius saith it signifies one void of judgment reason and brains Some will have this word Raca come of the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Racos Cloth as though one should call a man a base patch or piece of cloath or beggarly Raca signifies an idle head a light brain for so Rik in the Hebrew to which the Syriack word Racha agreeth both in sound and sense signifieth light or vain Racha is a Syriack word and signifies say some these three things 1. Empty as empty of wealth or poor or as some empty of brains or wit or as others a light head or cock-brain wide and empty of wisdom or understanding 2. It signifies spittle or spit upon to signifie that they esteemed one another no better than the spittle they spat out of their mouths 3. It signifies contemned vile despised abject and in this signification one in his Proeme of the Syriack Grammer thinks it to be taken The Ethiopian expounds Racha thus He that shall say to his Brother be poor by contempt and of torne Garments shall be guilty of the Counsel such a one saith our Saviour Shall be in danger of the Counsel that is contract as great guilt unto himself and is subject to as severe a judgment in the Court of Heaven as any capital crime that is censured in the Sanhedrim or
sufferings of Hell are eternal Certainly Infernal fire is neither tolerable nor terminable Impenitent Sinners in There is no Christian which doth doth not believe the fire of Hell to be everlasting Dr. Jackson on the Creed l. 11. c. 3. Hell shall have end without end death without death night without day mourning without mirth sorrow without solace and bondage without liberty the damned shall live as long in Hell as God Himself shall live in Heaven their imprisonment in that land of darkness in that bottomless pit is not an imprisonment during the Kings pleasure but an imprisonment during the everlasting displeasure of the King of Kings Suppose say some that the whole world were turned to a Mountain of Sand and that a little Wren should come every thousand year and carry away from that heap one grain of Sand what an infinite number of years not to be numbred by all finite beings would be spent and expired before this supposed Mountain could be fetcht away Now if a man should lye in everlasting burnings so long a time and then have an end of his Woe it would administer some ease refreshment and comfort to him but when that immortal Bird shall have carryed away this supposed Mountain a thousand times over and over alass alass sinful man shall be as far from the end of his anguish and torment as ever he was he shall be no neerer a coming out of Hell then he was the very first moment that he entred into Hell If the fire of Hell were terminable it might be tolerable but being endless it must needs be easeless Bellar de arte moâ—iendi l. 2. c. 3. and remediless we may well say of it as one doth O killing Life O immortal death Suppose say others that a man were to endure the torments of Hell as many years and no more as there be Sands on the Sea-shore drops of water in the Sea Stars in Heaven Leavs on Trees Piles of Grass on the ground Hairs on his head yea upon the heads of all the Sons of Adam that ever were or are or shall be in the world from the beginning of it to the end of it yet he would comfort himself with this poor thought Well there will come a day when my misery and torment shall certainly have an end But wo and alass this word Never Never Never will fill the hearts of the Damned with the greatest horror and terror wrath and rage amazement and astonishment Suppose say others that the torments of Hell were to end after a little Bird should have emptyed the Sea and only carry out her bill full once in a thousand years Suppose say others that the whole world from the lowest Earth to the highest Heavens were filled with grains of Sand and once in a thousand years an Angel should fetch away one grain and so continue till the whole heap were spent Suppose say others if one of the Damned in Hell should weep after this manner viz. That he should only let fall one tear in a thousand years and these should be kept together till such time as they should equal the drops of water in the Sea how many millions of Ages would pass before they could make up one River much more a whole and when that were done should he weep again after the same manner till he had filled a second a third and a fourth Sea if then there should be an end of their miseries there would be some hope some comfort that they would end at last but that they shall Never Never Never end This is that which sinks them under the most tormenting terrors and horrors You know that the extremity and eternity of Hellish torments is set forth by the Worm that never dyes and it is observable that Christ at the close of his Sermon makes a threefold repetition of this Worm Mark 9. 44. where their Worm dyeth not and again ver 48. where their Worm dyeth not and their fire goeth not out Certainly those punishments are beyond all conception and expression which our Lord Jesus doth so often inculcate within so small a pace Now if there be such a diversity extremity and eternity of Hellish pains and torments which the great God will certainly inflict upon the bodys and souls of all impenitent persons after the day of Judgment then there must certainly be some Hell some place of torment wherein the wrath of God shall be executed upon wicked and ungodly men But Sixthly The greatest part of wicked and ungodly men escape unpunished in this world the greatest number of men do spend their days in Pride ease pleasures and delights in Lust and Luxury in Voluptuousness Psal 73 3. to the 13. ver Job 21. 12. Amos 5. 6. and Wantonness They take the Timbrel and Harp and rejoyce at the sound of the Organ They chant to the sound of the Vial and invent themselves Instruments of Musick They drink Wine in bowls They lye upon beds of vers 3 Ivory and stretch themselves upon their Couches and eat the Lambs out of the Flock and the Calves out of the midst of the Stall and therefore there will be a time when these shall be punished in another world God doth not punish all here that he may make way Rom 2. 4 5. 2 Pet. 3 9. 15. vers for the displaying of his mercy and goodness his patience and forbearance Nor doth he forbear all here that he may manifest his Justice and Righteousness lest the World should turn Atheist and deny his Providence He spares that he may punish and he punisheth that he may spare God smites some Sinners in the very acting of their sins as he did Korah Dathan and Abiâ—am Num. 16. and others not till they have fill'd up the measure of their sins as you see in the men of the old World Gen. 6. 5 6 7. But the greatest number of sinners God reserves for the Math. 7. 13 great day of his Wrath. There is a sure punishment though not always a present punishment for every Sinner Eccles 8 12 13. Those wicked persons which God suffers to go uncorrected here He reserves to be punished for ever hereafter 2 Thes 1 7 8 9 10. Sinners know your Doom you must either smart for your sins in this world or in the world to come That Ancient hit the mark that said Many sins are punished in this World that the providence of God might be more Augustin Epist 54. apparent and many yea most reserved to be punished in the World to come that we might know that there is yet Judgment behind Sir James Hambleton having been Murdered by the Mr. Knox in his History of Scotland Scotish Kings means he appeared to the King in a Vision with a naked Sword drawn and strikes off both his arms with these words Take this before thou receivest a final payment for all thy impieties and within twenty-four hours two of the Kings Sons
he created the world Austin told him he was making Hell for such busie Questionists for such cuious inquirers into Gods secrets such handsome jerks are the best answers to men Deut. 29. 29. of curious minds But Thirdly I answer I concerns us but little to know whether Hell be in the Air or in the concave of the 3. Let us not be inquisitive where Hell is but rather let our care be to escape it saith Chrysostem earth or of what longitude latitude or profundity it is Let Hell be where it hath pleased God in his secret counsel to place it to men unknown whether in the North or in the South under the frozen Zone or under the burning Zone or in a pit or a gulf Our great care should be to avoid it to escape i and not to be curiously inquisitive about that place which the Lord in his infinite wisdom hath not thought fit clearly to reveil or make known to the sons of men In Hell there 's nothing heard but yells and cryes In Hell the Fire never slacks nor Worm never dies A Pentelâ—gia dolor inserm But where is this Hell plac'd my Muse stop there Lord shew me what it is but never where To worm and fire to torments there Prudentius the Poet. No term he gave they cannot wear Look as there are many that please themselves with discourses of the degrees of Glory whilest others make sure their interest in Glory So many please themselves with discourses of the degrees of the torments of Hell As in Heaven one is more glorious than another so in Hell one shall be more miserable than another Augustin whilest others make sure their escaping those torments and look as many take pleasure to be discoursing about the place where Hell is so some take pleasure to make sure their escaping of that place and certainly they are the best and wisest of men who spend most thoughts and time and pains how to keep out of it than to exercise themselves with disputes about it But Fourthly I answer That it has been the common opinion of the Fathers that Hell is in the bowels of the Infernum est locus subterraneus Teriu lib. 3. de Anim. earth yea Christ and the blessed Scriptures which are the highest authority do strongly seem to favour this opinion by speaking of a Descent unto Hell in opposition unto Heaven and therefore we may as well doubt whether Heaven be above us as doubt of Hell being beneath us Among other Scriptures ponder upon these Psal 140. 10. Let them be cast into the deep pits that they rise not up again Bring them down into the pit of destruction Prov. 9. 18. Her Guests are in the depths of Hell Prov. 15. 24. The way of life is above to the wise that he may depart from Hell beneath Sheol is sometimes taken for a pit sometimes for the Grave and sometimes and that significantly too for Hell all downwards One saith that Sheol generally signifies all Mercerus upon Gen. 37. places under the earth whence some conclude that Hell is in the heart of the earth or under the earth without doubt it is below because it is every where opposed to Heaven wich is above it is therefore called Abyssus a deep pit a vast gulf such a pit as by reason of the depth thereof may be said to have no bottom The Devils entreated Christ that he would not send them to this place Luke 8. 31. in Abyssum which is saith one Immensae profunditatis vorago quasi absque fundo Beza upon Mat. A Gulf of unmeasurable depth c. The Apostle 2 Pet. 2. 4. speaking of the Angels that sinned saith God cast them down into Hell So Beza in his Annotations telleth us the Greeks called that place which was ordained for the prison and torment of the damned And reason it self doth teach us that it must needs be opposite and contrary to that place in which the spirits of just men Heb. 12. 23. made perfect do reside which on all hands is granted to be above and Hell therefore must needs be below in the center of the earth say some which is from the Superficies three thousand five hundred miles as some judge Hesiod saith Hell is as far under the earth as Heaven is above it Some have been of opinion that the pit spoken of ino which Corah Dathan and Abiram went Num. 16. 3â— down alive when the earth clave asunder and swallowed them up was the pit of Hell into which both their souls and bodies were immediately conveyed As we know little in respect of the height of Heaven so we know as little in respect of the lowness of Hell Some of the upper part of the earth is to us yet terra incognita an unknown land but all of the lowest part of Hell is to us an unknown land Many thousands have travelled thither but none have returned thence to make reports or write Books of their travels That piece of Geography is very imperfect Heaven and Hell are the greatest opposites or remotest extremes Thou Capernaum which art exalted unto Heaven shalt be Matth. 11. 23. brought down to Hell Heaven and Hell are at furthest natural distance and are therefoe the everlasting receptacles of those who are at the furthest moral distance Believers and Unbelievers Saints and Impenitents And 't is observable that as the heighthe of Heaven so the depth of Hell is ascribed to wisdom to shew the unsearchableness of it O the depth as well as O the Rom. 11. 33. heighth of the wisdom of God! how unsearchable are his judgments and his wayes past finding out Certainly Gods depths and Sathans depths and Hells depths lie far out 1 Cor. 2. 10. Rev. 2. 24. of our view and are hard to be found out though I ought religiously to reverence the wonderful wisdom of God and to wonder at his unsearchable judgments yet I ought not curiously and prophanely to search beyond the compass of that which God hath reveiled to us in his word The Romans had a certain Lake the depth whereof they knew not this Lake they dedicated to Victory doubtless Hell is such a Lake the depth whereof no man knows 't is such a bottomless pit that no mortal can sound But Fifthly and Lastly I answer Some of the Learned are 5. 2 Pet. 3. 10. 11. 12. 13. of opinion that Hell is without this visible world which will pass away at the last day and removed at the greatest distance from the sedes Beaâ—orum the place where the righteous shall for ever inhabit Matth. 8. 12. In tenebras ex tenebris intelicitâ—r exâ—â—usi infâ—l â—ius exclu â—endi Augusâ—m But the children of the Kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness Matth. 22. 13. Then said the King to his servants bind him hand and foot and take him away and cast him into outer darkness Matth. 25. 30. And cast
other death I answer first because this was reckoned the most shameful and dishonourable of all deaths and was usually therefore the punishment of those that had by some notorious wickedness provoked God to pour out his wrath upon the whole land and so were hanged up to appease his wrath as you may see in the hanging of those Princes that were guilty of committing whoredome with the Daughters of Moab And in the hanging of Saul's seven Num. 25. 4. sons in the days of David when there was a Famine 2 Sam. 21. 6. 7. 8 2. in the land because of Saul's perfidious oppressing of the Gibeonites And in Joshuah's hanging of the five Kings of the Amorites But secondly and mainly it was Josh 16. 26. with respect to the Death Christ was to die God would have his Son the Lord Jesus to suffer this kind of death that hence it might be the more evident that in his death he bare the curse due to our sins according to that of the Apostle Gala. 3. 13. Christ was certainly made that curse which he redeemed us from otherwise the Apostle does not reason either soundly or fairly when he tells us we are redeemed from the curse because Christ was made a curse for us he remitteth that curse to us which he received in himself That Father hit the Bela in 3. ad Galat mark who saith Christus supplicium nostrum sine reatu suscepit ut solveret reatum finiret supplicium Christ hath taken our punishment without guilt to loose the guilt and end the punishment We were subject to the curse because we had transgressed the Law Christ was not subject because he had fulfilled it Eam ergo execrationem Oecumenius in 3. ad Galat. suscepit cui obnoxius non erat quum suspensus suit in ligno ut execrationem solveret quae adversùs nos erat He therefore took that curse to the which he was not subject when he hanged upon the tree to loose the curse which was against us Such a curse or execration was Christ made for us as was that from which he redeemed us and that curse from which he redeemed us was no other than the curse of the Law and that curse of the Law included all the punishment which sinners were to bear or suffer for transgression of the Law of which his hanging on the Cross was a sign and symbol and this curse was Christ made for us that is he did bear and suffer it to redeem us from it Christ was verily made a curse for us and did bear both in his body and soul that curse which by reason of the transgression of the Law was due to us And therefore I may well conclude this head with that saying of Hierome Injuria Domini nostra Hierom. in 3. ad Galat. Gloria The Lords injury is our Glory The more we ascribe to Christs suffering the less remaineth of ours the more painfully that he suffered the more fully are we redeemed the greater his sorrow was the greater our solace his dissolution is our consolation his Cross our Comfort his annoy our endless joy his distress in soul our release his calamity our comfort his misery our mercy his adversity our felicity his Hell our Heaven Christ is not only accursed but a curse and this expression is used both for more significancy and usefulness to note out the truth and realness of the thing and also to shew the order and way he took for bringing us back unto that blessedness which we had lost The Law was our righteousness in our innocent condition and so it was our blessedness but James 1. 24. the first Adam falling away from God by his first transgression plunged himself into all unrighteousness and so inwrapped himself in the curse Now Christ the second Adam that he may restore the lost man into an estate of blessedness he becomes that for them which the Law is unto them namely a curse beginning where the Law ends and so going backward to satisfie the demands Rom. 10. 4. of the Law to the uttermost he becomes first a curse for them and then their righteousness and so their blessedness Now Christs becoming a curse for us stands in this that whereas we are all accursed by the sentence of the Law because of sin he now comes in our room and stands under the stroke of that curse which of right belongs to us So that it lies not now any longer on the backs of poor sinners but on him for Heb. 7. 22. them and in their stead therefore he is called a Surety The Surety stands in the room of a Debtor Malefactor or him that is any way obnoxious to the Law such is Adam and all his posterity We are by the doom of the Law evil doâ—rs Transgressors and upon that score we stand indebted to the Justice of God and lie under the stroke of his wrath Now the Lord Jesus seeing us in this condition he steps in and stands between us and the blow yea he takes this wrath and curse off from us unto himself he stands not only or meerly after the manner of a Surety among men in the case of debt For here the Surety indeed enters bond with the principal for the payment of the debt but yet he expects that the debtor should not put him to it but that he should discharge the debt himself he only stands as a good security No Christ Jesus doth not expect that we should pay the debt our selves but he takes it wholly to himself As a Surety for a Murtherer or Traitor or some other notorious Malefactor that hath broken prison and is run away he lies by it body for body state for state and undergoes whatsoever the Malefactor is chargeable withal for satisfying the Law Even so the Lord Jesus Christ stands Surety for us runnagate Malefactors making himself liable to all that curse which belongs to us that he might both answer the Law fully and bring us back again to God As the first Adam stood in the room of all mankind fallen so Christ the second Adam stands in the room of all mankind which is to be restored he sustains the person of all those which do spiritually descend from him and unto whom he bears the relation of a Head Eph. 1. 22. 23. Christ did actually undergo and suffer the wrath of God and the fearful effects thereof in the punishments threatned in the Law As he became a debtor and was so accounted even so he became payment thereof he was made a sacrifice for sin and bare to the â—ull all that ever Divine Justice did or could require even the uttermost extent of the curse of the Law of God he must thus undergo the curse because he had taken upon him our sin The Justice of the most High God reveiled in the Law looks upon the Lord Jesus as a sinner because he hath undertaken for us and seiseth upon him
accordingly pouring down on his head the whole curse and all those dreadful punishments which are threatened in it against sin for the curse followeth sin as the shadow the body whether it be sin inherent or sin imputed even as the blessing follows righteousness whether it be righteousness inherent or righteousness imputed But Fifthly He that did feel and suffer the very torments of Hell though not after a hellish manner was God-man Christ participates of both natures being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God and man God-man such a Mediator sinners needed no Mediator but such a one who hath interest in both parties could serve their turns or save their souls and such a one is the Lord Jesus he hath an interest in both parties and he has an interest in both natures the God-head and the man hood The blessed Scriptures are so express and clear in these points that they must shut their eyes with a witness against the light that can't see Christ to be God man to be God and man I shall first speak something of Christ as he is God Now here are fathomless depths and bottomless 1 Pet. 1. 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The word signifies to look wishly and intently as the Cherâ—biâ—â—s of old look'd into the Mercy-Seat Exod. 25. 18 19 It signifie prying into a thing over-veiled and hidden from â—ight to look as we say wishly at it as if we would look even through it bottoms if I may so speak here are stupendious and amazing mysteries astonishing and confounding excellencies such as the holy Angels themselves desire to pry into God is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dwelling in accessible light 1 Tim. 6. 16. Here are such beauties and perfections that had I as the Poet speaks a hundred tongues a hundred mouths and a voice of steel yet I could not sufficiently describe them Nevertheless give me lieve to say something concerning our Lord Jesus Christ who is one eternal God with the Father and with the Holy Ghost I might produce a cloud of witnesses in the case but it is enough that we have the Authority of the sacred Scriptures both in the Old and New Testament confirming of it and therefore I shall lay down some proofs or demonstrations of the eternal Godhead of Christ which I shall draw out of the blessed Scripture This is a point of high concernment that Christ is God so high as whosoever buildeth not upon this buildeth upon the Sands This is the rock of our Salvation The word was God Concerning John 1. 1. this important point consider First That the Godhead of Christ is clearly asserted and manifested both in the Old and New Testament Take a taste of some of those many Scriptures which might be cited Isa 43. 10. 11 12. That ye may know Compare these Scriptures of the Old Testament with these in the New Heb. 1. 2 3. 1 John 1. 7. Aâ—s 4. 12. Eph. 4. 8. Râ—m 9. 30. Jer. 33. 23. Psal 6. 68 18 19 20. and believe and understand that I am he I even I am Jehovah and besides me there is no Saviour And Isa 41. 21. 22 23 24 25. There is no God else besides me A just God and Saviour there is none besides me Look unto me and be ye saved all the ends of the earth for I am God and there is none else To me every knee shall bow In Jehovah have I righteousness In Jehovah shall the seed of Israel be justified Compare this with Rom. 14. 10 11. And the Socinians may as safely conclude that there is no other God but Jesus Christ as they may conclude that there is no God but God the Father from the seventeenth of John But they and we ought to conclude from these Scriptures that Jesus Christ is not a different God from the Father but is one and the same God with him so he is called The mighty God The everlasting Father Isa 9. 6. Take a few clear places out of the New Testament as that in Rom. 9. 5. Of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came who is over all God blessed for ever more Christ is here himself called God blessed for ever So Tit. 2. 13. Looking for that hope and the glorious appearance of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ Who is it that shall appear at the last day in the clouds but Christ who is called the great God and our Saviour God blessed for ever saith Paul to the Romans The great God saith Paul to Titus 1 John 5. 20. And we know that the Son of God is come and hath given us an understanding that we may 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 Phil. 2. 6. He was in the form of God and thought it no robbery to be equal with God And Coloss 2. 9. In him dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead bodily John 20. 28. My Lord and my God 1 Tim. 3. 16. God manifested in the flesh To which of Heb. 1. 1. the Saints or Angels did God say at any time thou art my Son The Heir of all things the illustrious brightness of my Glory and lively character of my person Thy Throne oh God is for ever and ever and all the Angels of God shall worship thee Certainly he who is Gods own proper natural consubstantial coessential only begotten Son he is God where ever this Sonship is there 's the Deity or the Divine Essence Now Christ is thus Gods son therefore he is God What the Father is as to his nature that the Son must also be now the first person the Father of Christ is God whereupon he too who is the Son must be God also A Son always participates of his Fathers essence there is betwixt them evermore an Identity and oneness of nature if therefore Christ be Gods Son as is most evident throughout the Scripture he is then he must needs have that very nature and essence which God the Father hath insomuch that if the second person be not really a God the first person is but equivocally a Father These Scriptures out of the Old and New Testament are so evident and pregnant to prove the Godhead of Christ that they need no illustration yea they speak so fully for the Divinity of Christ that all the Arians and Socinians in the world do but in vain go about to elude them But Secondly Let us ponder seriously upon these Scriptures John 3. 13. And no man hath ascended up to Heaven but he that came down from Heaven even the Son of man which is in Heaven v. 31. He that cometh from above is above all he that cometh from Heaven is above all John 8. 23. Ye are from beneath I am from above John 16. 28. I came forth from the Father and am come into the world and again I leave the world and go to the Father Now from these blessed Scriptures we may
thus argue He who was in Heaven before he was on the earth and who was also in Heaven whilest he was on the earth is certainly the eternal God but all this doth Jesus Christ strongly assert concerning himself as is evident in the Scriptures last cited therefore he is the eternal God blessed for ever But Thirdly Christs eternal Deity Coequality and Consubstantiality with the Father may be demonstrated from his Divine Names and Titles As First Jehovah is one of the incommunicable names of God which signifies his eternal essence The Jews observe that in Gods name Jehovah the Exod. 15. 3. Gen. 2. 4. The Jews call it Nomen Dei inessabile But this name Jehovah is not unspeakable in regard of the name but in regard of the essence of God set forth by it as Zanchy noteth This name was always thrice repeated when the Priest blessed the people Num. 6. 24 25 26. Trinity is implied Je signifies the Present tense Ho the praeterperfect tense Vah the future The Jews also observe that in his name Jehovah all the Hebrew letters are literae quiescentes that denote rest implying that in God and from God is all our rest Every gracious soul is like Noah's Dove he can find no rest nor satisfaction but in God God alone is the godly mans Ark of rest and safety Jehovah is the incommunicable name of God and is never attributed to any but God Psal 83. 19. Thou whose name alone is JEHOVAH Jehovah is a name so full of Divine mysteries that the Jews hold it unlawful to pronounce it Jehovah signifies three things 1. That God is an eternal independent being of himself 2. That he gives being to all creatures Acts 17. 28. 3. That he doth and will give being to his promises God tells Moses Exod. 6. 3. That he appeared unto Abraham unto Isaac and unto Jacob by the name of El Gen. 22. 14. Abraham called the name of the place Jehovahlireh the Lord will see or provide Besides the Fathers of old are said not to have known God by his name Jehovah in comparison of that which their posterity knew afterwards for to them God made himself more clearly and plenarily known Shaddai God Almighty but by my name JEHOVAH was I not known to them The name Jehovah was known to Abraham Isaac and Jacob but not mysterium nominis the mystery of the name This was reveiled to Moses from God and from Moses to the people It is meant of the performances of his great promises made to Abraham God did promise to give the land of Canaan to Abraham's Seed for an inheritance which promise was not performed to him but to his seed after him so that this is the meaning God appeared to Abraham Isaac and Jacob El Shaddai God Almighty in protecting delivering and rewarding of them but by his name Jehovah he was not known to them God did perform his promise made to Abraham Isaac and Jacob but unto their seed and posterity after them This name Jehovah is the proper and peculiar name of the one only true God a name as far significant of his nature and being as possibly we are enabled to understand so that this is taken for granted on all hands that he whose name is Jehovah is the only true God when ever that name is used properly without a Trope or figure it is used of God only Now this glorious name Jehovah that is so full of mysteries is frequently ascribed to Christ Isa 6. 1. He is called Jehovah for there Isaiah is said to see Jehovah sitting upon a Throne c. And John 12. 41. This is expresly by the holy Evangelist applyed to Christ of whom he saith That Isaiah saw his glory and spake of him Exod. 17. 1. The people are said to tempt Jehovah and the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 10. 9. Let us not tempt Christ as some of them also tempted and were destroyed of Serpents It is said of Jehovah Of old hast thou laid the Psal 102. 25. 26. foundation of the earth and the Heavens are the works of thy hands they shall perish but thou shalt endure c. And the Apostle clearly testifies Heb. 1. 10. That these words are spoken of Christ So Jehovah rained fire and brimstone from Jehovah out of Heaven Gen. 19. 24. That is Jehovah the Son of God that stayed with Abraham Gen. 18. rained fire and brimstone from Jehovah the Father and Christ is called Jehovah Tsidkenu the Lord our righteousness and in that Zach. 13. 7. Christ is called the Fathers fellow The Lord Christ is that Jehovah to whom every knee must bow as appears by comparing Isa 45. 21 22 23 24 25. with Romans 14. 9 10 11 12. and Phil. 2. 6 9 10 11. I might further insist upon this argument and shew that the title of Lord so often given to Christ in the New Testament doth answer to the Title of Jehovah in the Old Testament And as some learned men conceive the Apostles did purposely use the Title of Lord that they might not offend the Jews with frequent pronouncing of the word Jehovah Thou shalt fear Jehovah thy God Deut. 6. 13. Deut. 10. 20. is rendred by the Apostle Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God And so Deut. 6. 5. Thou shalt love Jehovah thy God is rendred Matth. 22. 37. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God Thus you see that in several precious Scriptures Jesus Christ is called Jehovah and therefore we may very safely and confidently conclude that Jesus Christ is very God God blessed for ever But The second Name or Title which denotes the essence 2 The Hebrew Ehieh asher Ehieh properly signifies I will be that I will be The Septuagint renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am he that is and in that Rev. 16. 5. God is called he that is and that was and that will be of God is Ehieh I am that I am or I will be what I I will be Exod. 3. 14. It hath the same root with Jehovah and signifies that God is an eternal unchangeable being some make this name to be Gods extraordinary name Damascene saith this name containeth all things in it like a vast and infinite Ocean without bounds This Glorious name of God I AM THAT I AM implyes these six things 1. Gods incomprehensibleness as we use to say of any thing we would not have others prye into it is what it is so God saith here to Moses I AM WHAT I AM. 2. It implies Gods Immensity that his being is without any limits Angels and men have their beings but then they are bounded and limited within such a compass but God is an immense being that cannot be included within any bounds 3. It implyes that God is of himself and hath not a being dependent upon any other I am that is by and from and of my self 4. It implyes Gods eternal and unchangeable being in himself It implyes God's everlastingness I am before any thing was
sits on the the Throne so Christ will both raise himself and ease himself by that vengeance that he will take on his enemies c. Now from thâ—se divine Names and Titles which are given to Jesus Christ we may thus argue He to whom the incommunicable Titles of the most high God are attributed he is the most high God but the incommunicable Titles of the most high God are attributed unto Christ ergo he is the most high God But Fourthly Christ's eternal Deity Coequality and Consubstantiality with the father may be demonstrated from his divine Properties and Attributes I shall shew you for the opening of this that the glorious Attributes of God are ascribed to the Lord Jesus I shall begin First with the Eternity of God God is an eternal God 1. Eternity is taken three ways 1 Proâ—â—â—â— preâ—â—rly so it nâ—teth to be withâ—ut beginning and end so God only is eternal 2. Improprie impâ—â—perly so it noteth to have a beginning but no ending so Angels so the souls of meâ— are eternal 3. Aâ—usive so some things are said to be eternal which have had a beginning shall also have an end they are called eternal in respect of their long continuance and duration so ciâ—â—â—â—â—iâ—on and other Mosaical ceremonies were called eternal or everlasting From everlasting to everlasting thou art God Psal 90. 2. The eternal God is thy refuge Deut. 33. 27. He inhabits eternity Isa 57. 15. He is called the Ancient of days Dan. 7. 9. And he is said to be everlasting and to be King of old Psal 74 12. this sheweth he had no beginning In respect of his eternity after time he is called the everlasting God Rom. 16. 26. An everlasting King 1 Tim. 1. 17. That there is no succession or priority or posteriority in God but that he is from everlasting to everlasting the same we may see Psal 102. 26 27. The heavens shall perish but thou shalt endure yea all of them shall wax old like a garment and as a vesture shalt thou change them and they shall be changed but thou art the same and thy years shall have no end There is no succession or variation in God but he is eternally the same Eternity is an interminable being and duration before any time and boyond all time it is a fixed duration without beginning or ending The Eternity of God is beyond all possible conception of measure or time God ever was ever is and ever shall be Though the manifestations of himself unto the Creatures are in time yet his Essence or being never did nor shall be bound up by time look backward or forward God from eternity to eternity is a most self-sufficient infinite perfect blessed being the first cause of our being and without any cause of his own being an eternal infinite fulness and possession to himself and of himself what Gid is he was from Eternity and what God is he will be so to eternity O this glorious attribute drops myrth and mercy oyl and honey Now this attribute of eternity is ascribed to Jesus Christ John 1. 1. In the beginning was the word was notes some former duration therefore we conclude that he was before the beginning before any creation or creatures for it is said he was God in the beginning and his divine nature whereby he works is eternal Heb. 9. 14. He is the first and last Rev. 1. 17. hence it is that he is called the first-born of every creature because he who created all and upholds all hath power to command and dispose of all as the first born had power to command the family or kingdom Colos 1. 15 16 17. compare Isa 44. 6. with Rev. 22. 13. Joh. 17. 5. Father glorifie thou me with thine own self with the glory I had with thee before the world was Such glory had the Lord Christ with his father viz. in the heavens and that before the world was this he had not only in regard of Destinátion being predestinated to it by God his father as Grotius would evade it but in regard of actual possession The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way saith Christ the son of God Prov. 8. 22. And as his father possessed him so he John 8. â—8 John 17. 24. Rev. 1. 8. 17. Heb. 1. 10. 11. 12. cap. 7. 3. Isa 9. 6. c. Christ is without beginning of days or end of time and without all bounds of precession or succession was possessed of the self-same glory with his Father before the world was from Eternity His goings forth have been from of old from everlasting from the days of Eternity saith the Prophet Micah speaking of the Messiah Mic. 5. 2. See the Eternity of Christ farther confirmed by the Scriptures in the margent But Secondly As the Attribute of Eternity is ascribed to Christ so the Attribute of Omniscience is ascribed to 2. Chrysostom Christ and this speaks out the Godhead of Christ he knows all things John 21. 17. Lord thou knowest all things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all things present and future what I now am and what I shall be saith one on the words John 2. 25. He needed not that any should testifie of man for he knew what was in man Shall Artificers know the nature and properties of their works and shall not Christ know the hearts of men which are the work of his own hands Rev. 2. 23. And all the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts Now of all a man's inwards the heart and the reins are the most inward Christ is nearer to us than we are to our selves the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is here rendred searcheth signifies to search with the greatest seriousness exactness and diligence that can be the word is metaphorically taken from such as use to search in Mines Mat. 9. 24. and cap. 12. 25. Luk. 5. 22. cap. 6. 18. Luk. 11. 17. and cap. 24. 38. c. for Silver and Gold He is also frequently said to know the thoughts of men and that before they bewrayed themselves by any outward expressions Now this is confessedly God 's peculiar God which knoweth the hearts 15. 8. He is the wisdom of the father 1 Cor. 1. 24. He knows the father and doth according to his will reveal the secrets of his father's bosom the bosom is the seat of love and secrecy John 1. 18. men admit those into their bosoms with whom they impart all their secrets the breast is the place of Counsels that is Christ revealeth the secret and mysterious Counsels and the tender compassionate affections of the father to the world Being in the bosom implyeth communication of secrets the bosom is a place for them it is a speech of Tully to a friend that had betrusted him with a secret crede mihi c. believe me saith he what thou hast committed to me it is in my bosom still I am not ungirt to
third branch to this distinction and maketh it more plain by saying That all things that were made are either visible or invisible or mixt visible as the Stars and Fouls and Clouds of Heaven the Fish in the Sea and Beasts upon the Earth Invisible things as the Angels they also were made Then there is a third sort of creatures which are of a mixt nature partly visible in regard of their bodies and partly invisible in regard of their souls and those are Men Eph. 2. 9. who created all things by Jesus Christ Heb. 1. 2. He hath in these last days spoken to us by his son whom he hath appointed heir of all things by whom also he made the worlds This may seem somewhat difficult because he speaketh of worlds whereas we acknowledg but one but this seeming difficulty you may easily get over if you please but to consider the persons to whom he writes which were Hebrews whose custom it was to stile God Rabboni Dominus mundorum the Lord of the worlds They were wont to speak of three worlds The lower world the higher world and the middle world The lower world containeth the Elements Earth and Water and Air and Fire The higher world that containeth the Heaven of the blessed And the middle world that containeth the starry Heaven They now being acquainted with this language and the Apostle writing to them he saith that God by Christ made the worlds those worlds which they were wont to speak so frequently of And whereas one scruple might arise from that expression in the Ephesians God created all things By Jesus Christ and this to the Hebrews By whom he made the worlds As if Christ were only an instrument in the Creation and not the principal efficient Therefore another place in this chapter will clear it which speaketh of Christ as the principal Efficient of all things Heb. 1. compare the 8th and 10th verses together To the son he saith thy throne O God is for ever and ever then Christ is God then And thou Lord vers 10. hast laid the foundation of the earth and the heavens are the works of thy hands Namely thine that is the Son which he spake of before Christ is the principal Efficient of the Creation and in this sence it is said by him were all things made not as by an instrument but as by the chief Efficient 6. The preservation and sustentation of all things Colos 1. 17. by him all things consist They would soon fall asunder had not Christ undertaken to uphold the shattered condition thereof by the word of his power All creatures that are made are preserved by him in being life and motion Heb. 1. 3. He upholdeth all things by the word of his power Both in respect of being excellencies and operations sin had hurled confusion over the world which would have fallen about Adam's ears had not Christ undertaken the shattered condition thereof to uphold it He keeps the world together saith one as the hoops do the barrel Christ bears up all things continuing to the several creatures their being ordering and governing them and this he doth by the word of his power by this word he made the world He spake and it was done And by this word he governeth the world by his own mighty word the word of his power both these are divine actions and being ascribed unto Christ evidence him to be no less than God Now from what has been said we may thus argue He to whom those actions are ascribed which are proper to the most high God he is the most high God but such actions or works are ascribed to Christ ergo he is the most high God But Sixthly Christ's eternal Deity may be demonstrated from that divine honour and worship that is due to him and by Angels and Saints given unto him The Apostle sheweth Gal. 4. 8. That religious worship ought to be performed to none but to him that is God by nature and that they are ignorant of the true God who religiously worship them that are no Gods by nature and therefore This is a clear full evidence that Jesus Christ is and must be more than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mere mâ—n or yet a divine man as Doctor Lusâ—ing â—n stiles him in Heb. 7. 22. vers if Christ were not God by nature and consubstantial with the father we ought not to perform religious worship to him Divine worship is due to the second person of this coessential Trinity to Jesus Christ our Lord and God There is but one immediate formal proper adequate and fundamental reason of divine worship or adorability as the schools speak and that is the soveraign supreme singular majesty independent and infinite excellency of the eternal Godhead for by divine worship we do acknowledge and declare the infinite majesty truth wisdom goodness and glory of our blessed God we do not esteem any thing worthy of divine honour and worship which hath but a finite and created glory because divine honour is proper and peculiar to the only true God who will not give his glory to any other who is not God God alone is the adequate object of divine faith hope love and worship because these graces are all exercised and this worship performed in acknowledgment of his infinite perfection and independent excellency and therefore no such worship can be due to any creature or thing below God There is not one kind of divine honour due to the father and another to the son nor one degree of honour due to the father and another to the son for there can be no degrees imaginable in one and the same excellency which is single because infinite and what is infinite doth excel and transcend all degrees and bounds And if there be no degrees in the ground and adequate reason of divine worship there can be no reason or ground of a difference of degrees in the worship it self The father and the son are one one in power excellency nature Jâ—hn 10. 30. one God and therefore to be honoured with the same worship That all men should honour the son even as John 5. 23. they honour the father every tongue must confess that Jesus Christ who is man is God also and therefore equal Pâ—il 2. 6 11 12. to his father and it can be no robbery no derogation to the father's honour for us to give equal honour to him and his coequal son who subsists in the form of God in the nature of God Thus you see the divine nature the infinite excellency of Jesus Christ is an undeniable ground of this coequal honour and therefore the worship due to Christ as God the same God with his father is the very same worship both for kind and degree which is due to the father But for the further and clearer opening of this consider First that all inward worship is due to Christ as 1. Believing on him Faith is a worship which belongs only to God
of the Mediator because of his fulness we all receive grace for grace and herein sheweth the unity of Essence in the holy Trinity and community of Power Wisdom Sanctity Truth Eternity Glory Majesty such is the strict union of the persons of the blessed Trinity that there is among them a perfect communion in all things for all things that the father hath are mine And let thus much suffice for the proof of the Godhead of Christ Concerning the Manhood of Christ let me say that as he is very God so he is very man 1 Tim. 2. 5. The man Christ Jesus Christ is true man but not mere man verus sed non merus The word is not to be taken exclusively as denying the Divine Nature Christ is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both God and man sometimes denominated from the one nature and sometimes from the other sometimes called God and sometimes man yet so as he is truly both and in that respect fitly said to be a Mediator betwixt God and men having an interest in and participating of both natures This Title THE SON OF MAN is given to Christ in the New Testament four score and eight times The design being not only to express a man according to the Syrian Dialect then used 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bar Nosho nor only to express Christ's Humanity who was truly man in all things like unto us sin only excepted nor only to intimate his humility by calling himself so often by this humble name but also to tell us to what a high honour God hath raised our nature in him and to confute their Imaginations who denied him to be very Man Flesh Blood and Bones as we truly are and who held that whatever he was and whatever he did and whatever he suffered was only seeming and in appearance and not real and to lead us to that original promise the first that was made to Mankind The seed of the woman shall bruise Gen. 3. 15. the serpent's head that so he might intimate saith Epiphanius that himself was the party meant intended and foretold of by all the Prophets who was to come into the world to all nations in the world Jews and Gentiles originally a like descended of the woman who both had a like interest in the woman and her seed though the Rom. 3. 1 2. Jews did and might challenge greater propriety in the seed of Abraham than the Gentiles could but they having been a long time as it were God's Favourites a selected People a chosen Nation did wholly appropriate Exod. 19 6. 1 Pet. 2. 9. the Messias to themselves and would endure no co-partners nor that any should have any right title or interest in him but themselves and therefore they would never talk otherwise than of the Messias the King of Israel the son of David never naming him once the light of the Isa 42. 6. Isai 3. 6. Isai 63. 5. Gen. 3. 15. Luk. 3. 23. to the end Gentiles the expectation of the Gentiles the hope and desire of the eternal hills the hope of all the ends of the earth the seed of the woman the son of man as descending from Eve extracted from Adam and allied unto all Mankind And it is observable that the Evangelist Luke at the story of Christ's Baptism when he was to be installed into his Ministry and had that glorious testimony from Heaven deriveth his Pedigree up to the first Adam the better to draw all men's eyes to that first promise concerning the seed of the woman and to cause them to own him for that seed there promised and for that effect that is there mentioned of dissolving the works of Satan And as that Evangelist giveth that hint when he is now entring this quarrel with Satan even in the entrance of his Ministry so doth he very frequently and commonly by this very Phrase give the same intimation for the same purpose no sooner had Nathaniel proclaimed him the son of God John 1. 49. Nathaniel answered and said unto him Rabbi thou art the son of God thou art the king of Israel but he instantly titles himself THE SON OF MAN vers 51. not only to shew his humanity for that Nathaniel was assured of by the words of Philip who calls him Jesus of Nazareth the son of Joseph vers 45. but also to draw the thoughts of the hearers to the first promise and to work them to look for a full recovery of all that by the second Adam which was lost in the first Though the gates of Heaven were shut against the first Adam by reason of his fall yet were they open to the second Adam vers 51. And he saith unto him verily verily I say unto you This double Asseveration verily verily puts the matter beyond all doubt and controversie hereafter you shall see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the son of man the Jacob's He alludes to Jacob's Ladder Gen 28. 12. v. Ladder the Bridg that joyneth Heaven and Earth together as Gregory hath it This 51. vers doth greatly illustrate Christ's glory and farther confirm believers saith that Christ is Lord of Angels even in his state of humiliation and hath them ready at his call as he or his people shall need their service to move from earth to heaven and from heaven to earth This Title THE SON OF MAN shews that the Son of God was also the son of man and that he delighted to be so and therefore doth so often take this Title to himself THE SON OF MAN Now concerning the Manhood of Christ the Prophet plainly speaks Isa 9. 6. Vnto us a child is born and unto us a son was given Parvulus a child that noteth his humanity Filius a son that noteth his Deity parvulus a child even man of the substance of his mother born in the Mat. 1. 25. world filius a son even God of the substance of his father begotten before the world Parvulus a child behold Prov. 8. 22. to the end Luk. 2. 7. his humility she brought forth her first born Son and wrapped him in swadling-cloaths and laid him in a manger Filius a son behold his dignity when he bringeth in his first begotten son into the world he saith and let all the Angels of God worship him to prove that he was Heb. 1. 6. v. man 't is enough to say that he was born he lived he died God became man by a wonderful unspeakable and unconceivable union Behold God is offended by man's affecting and coveting his wisdom and his glory for that was the Devil's temptation to our first parents ye shall Gen. 3. 5. be as Gods and man is redeemed by God's assuming and taking his frailty and his infirmity man would be as God and so offended him and therefore God becomes man and so redeemeth him Christ as man came of Acts 17. 31. Isa 7. 14. the race of Kings As man he shall judg the world
honour fire will descend as on Sodom and Gomorrah and water Gen. 19. Exod. 14. 22. though a fluid body stand up like a solid wall as in the Red Sea if he do but speak the word Oh let not the inanimate creatures one day rise in judgment against us for not giving Christ his due honour if we honour Christ we shall have honour that is a bargain of Christ's own making but if we dishonour him he will put dishonour 1 Sam. 2. 30. upon us as Scripture and History in all Ages do sufficiently evidence in History we read of an Impostor that gave it out that he was that star which Balaam prophesied Nâ—m 24. 17. of which was a Prophecy of Christ this fellow called himself Ben-chomar the son of a Star this man professed himself to be Christ but he was slain with thunder and lightning from heaven and then the Jews called him Ben-cosmar which signifieth the son of a lye Learned Synag Julaics cap. 5. 36. Buxtorf tells us that the Jews call Christ Bar-chozabb the son of a lye a Bastard and his Gospel Aven-gelaion the Volume of lyes or the Volume of iniquity and hath not God been a revenging this upon them for above this sixteen hundred years Rabbi Samuel who long since writ a Tract in form of an Epistle to Rabbi Isaac Master of the Synagogue of the Jews wherein he doth excellently discuss the cause of their long Captivity and extreme misery and after that he had proved it was inflicted for some grievous sin he sheweth that sin to be the same which Amos speaks of For three transgressions of Israel and for Amos. 2. 6. four I will not turn away the punishment thereof because they sold the righteous for silver and the poor for a pair of shooes The selling of Joseph he makes the first sin the worshipping the Calf in Horeb the second sin the abusing and killing God's Prophets the third sin and the selling of Jesus Christ the fourth sin For the first they served four hundred years in Egypt for the second they wandred forty years in the Wilderness for the third they were Captives seventy years in Babylon and for the fourth they are held in pitiful Captivity even to this very-day Oh how severely has God reveng'd the wrongs and indignities done to Christ the Lord by this miserable people to this very hour and yet Oh the several ways wherein this poor people do every day express their malice and hatred against the Lord Jesus Oh pray pray hard that the veil may be taken away that has been so long before their eyes Herod imprisons Peter and killeth Act. 12. 1 2 3 4 James with the sword this God puts up but when he comes to usurp the honour due to Christ he must die vers 23. for it Herod might more safely take away the liberty of one and the life of another than the glory due to Christ long before his death being in chains he met with a strange Omen For as he stood bound before the Palace Josephus of the Antiquities of the Jews lib. 18. pag. 475. 476. leaning dejectedly upon a tree among many others that were prisoners with him an Owl came and sat down in that Tree to which he leaned which a German seeing being one of those that stood there bound he asked who he was that was in the Purple and leaned there and understanding who he was he told him of his enlargment promotion to honour and prosperity and that when he should see that bird again he should die within five days after Now when Herod had imprisoned Peter and slain James with the sword he went down to Caesarea and there he made sports and shows in honour of Cesar and Pag. 510. 511. on the second day being most gorgeously apparelled and the Sun shining very bright upon his Robe of Silver his flatterers saluted him for a God and cryed out to him Be merciful unto us hitherto have we feared thee as a man but hence forward we will acknowledg thee to be of a nature more excellent than mortal frailty can attain to the wretched King reproved not this abominable flattery but was well pleased with it and not long after he espyed the Owl which the German had foretold to be the Omen of his death And suddenly he was seized with miserable gripings in his belly which came upon him with vehement extremity whereupon turning himself towards his friends saith Loe he whom ye esteem for a God is doomed to die and destiny shall evidently confute you in those flattering and false speeches which you lately used concerning me for I who have been adored by you as one immortal am now under the hands of death and his griefs and torments increasing his death drew on apace whereupon he was removed into the Palace and all the people put on Sack-cloth and lay on the ground praying for him which he beholding could not refrain from tears and so after five days he gave up the Ghost Thus you see how dearly they have paid for it that have not given Christ his due glory and let these instances of his wrath alarm all your hearts so that we may make more conscience than ever of setting the Crown of honour only upon Christ's head for he only is worthy of all honour glory and praise Rev. 14. 10 11. But Sixthly Is Jesus Christ God-man is he very God and very man then from hence as in a glass you may see the true Reasons why the death and sufferings of Christ though short very short yet have a sufficient power and vertue in them to satisfie God's justice to pacifie his wrath to procure our pardon and to save our immortal souls viz. because of the dignity of his person that died and suffered for us the son of God yea God himself there was an infinite vertue and value in all his sufferings hence his Heb. 9. 14. 1 Pet. 1. 19. Acts 20. 28. Gal. 4. 4 5 6. blood is called precious blood yea the blood of God did man transgress the Royal Law of God behold God himself is become a man to make up that breach and to Rom. 8. 2 3 4. satisfie divine Justice to the uttermost farthing for the man Christ Jesus to stand before the bar of the Law and to make full and compleat reparation to it was the highest honour that ever was done to the Law of God this is infinitely more pleasing and delightful to divine Justice than if all the curses of the Law had been poured out upon fallen man and than if the Law had built up its honour upon the destruction of the whole Creation To see one Sun clouded is much more than to see the Moon and all the Stars in Heaven overcast Christ considered as God-man was great very great and the greater his person was the greater were his sorrows his sufferings his Isa 53. humiliation his compassion his satisfaction
licence yet the great King of Heaven and Earth counts it his glory to give us free access at all times in all places and upon all occasions by the man Christ Jesus 1 Tim. 2. 5. There is one mediator between God and us even the man Christ Jesus Christ was made true man that in our nature he might reconcile us to God and give us access to God which he could never have done had he not been very God and very man without the humane nature of Christ we could never have had access to God or fellowship with God being by nature enemies to God Rom. 5. 10. Eph. 2. 1. 12 13 14. and estranged from God and dead in trespasses and sins 'T is only by the mediation of Christ incarnate that we come to be reconciled to God to have access to him and 1 John 1. 1 2 3. acceptance with him in Christ's humane nature God and we meet together and have fellowship together It could never stand with the unspotted holiness and justice of God who is a consuming fire to honour us with one Heb. 12. 29. cast of his countenance or one hours communion with himself were it not upon the account of the man Christ Jesus the least serious thought of God out of Christ will breed nothing in the soul but horrour and amazement which made Luther say Nolo Deum absolutum let me have nothing to do with an absolute God Believers have free and blessed access to God but still 't is upon the credit of the man Christ Jesus Let us come boldly to the throne Heb. 4. 15. 16. of Grace saith the Apostle speaking of Christ that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need the Apostles phrase is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word which signifies liberty of speech and boldness of face as when a man with a bold and undaunted spirit utters his mind before the great ones of the world without blushing without weakness of heart without shaking of his voice without imperfection and faltring in speech when neither Majesty nor Authority can take off his courage so as to stop his mouth and make him afraid to speak with such heroick and undaunted spirits would the Apostle have us to come to the Throne of Grace and all upon the credit of Christ our High Priest who is God-man But Ninthly Is Jesus Christ God-man is he very God and 9. Ezek. 35. 10 11 12 13. Isa 37. 23 24. very man then you may be very confident of his sympathizing with you in all your afflictions then this may serve as a foundation to support you under all your troubles and as a Cordial to comfort you under all your afflictions in that Christ partaking of the same nature and having had experience of the infirmities of it he is the more able and willing to help and succour us Heb. 2. 17. wherefore As the Brazen Serpent was like the fiery serpent but had no sting in all things it behoveth him to be like his brethren that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people so Heb. 4. 15. If one come to visit a man that is sick of a grievous disease who hath himself been formerly troubled with the same disease he will sympathize more and shew more compassion than twenty others who have not felt the like so here from Christ's sufferings in his humane nature we may safely gather that he will shew himself a merciful high Priest to us in our sufferings and one that will be ready to help and succour us in all our afflictions and miseries which we suffer in this life in as much as himself had experience of suffering the like in our nature for in that he himself hath suffered being tempted he is able to succour them that are tempted and this should be a staff to support us and a cordial to comfort us in all our sorrows and miseries It is between Christ and his Church as it is between two lute strings that are tuned one to another no sooner is one struck If weperish Christ persheth with us Luâ—her but the other trembles Isa 63. 9. In all their afflictions he was afflicted These words may be read interrogatively thus was he in all their afflictions afflicted Christ took to heart the afflictions of his Church he was himself grieved for them and with them The Lord the better to allure and draw his people to himself speaks after the manner of men attributing to himself all the affection love and fatherly compassion that can possibly be in them to men in misery Christ did so sympathize with his people in all their afflictions and sufferings as if he himself had felt the weight the smart the pain of them all he was in all things made like unto his brethren not only in nature but also in infirmities and sufferings and by all manner of temptations that thereby he might be able experimentally to succour them that are tempted he Zech. 2. 8. Ishon of Ish It is here called Bath the daughter of the eye because it is as dear to a man as his only daughter Act. 9. 4. Mat. 25. 35 36. that toucheth them toucheth not only his eye but the apple of his eye which is the tenderest piece of the tenderest part to express the inexpressible tenderness of Christ's compassion towards them let persecutors take heed how they meddle with God's eyes for he will retaliate eye for eye Exod. 21. 24. he is wise in heart and mighty in strength and sinners shall one day pay dear for touching the apple of his eye Christ counts himself persecuted when his Church is persecuted Saul Saul why persecutest thou me And he looks upon himself as hungry thirsty naked and in prison when his members are so so greatly does he sympathize with them hence the afflictions of Christians are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the remainders of the afflictions of Christ such as Christ by his fellow-feeling suffereth in his members and as they by correspondency are to fill up as exercises and tryals of their faith and patience Christ gave many evidences of his sympathy or fellow-feeling of our infirmities when he was on earth as he groaned in his spirit John 11. 33. and was troubled when he saw those that wept for Lazarus vers 35. Luk. 19. 41. he wept also as he did over Jerusalem also It is often observed in the Gospel that Christ was moved with compassion and that he frequently put forth acts of pity mercy and succour to those that were in any distress either in body or soul Christ retaineth this sympathy and fellow-feeling with us now he is in Heaven and doth so far commiserate our distresses as may stand with a glorified condition Jesus Christ grieves for the afflictions of his people the angel of the Lord answered and Zach. 1. 12. said
instances and not blush Certainly the more Christ hath suffered for us the more dear Christ should be unto us the more bitter his sufferings have been for us the more sweet his love should be to us and the more eminent should be our love to him O let a suffering Christ lie nearest your hearts let him be your Manna your Tree of Life your Morning-star 't is better to part with all than with this Pearl of price Christ is that golden pipe through which the golden oyl of salvation runs and oh how should this inflame our love to Christ Oh that our hearts were more affected with the sufferings of Christ Who can tread upon these hot coals and his Can. 8. 7 8. heart not burn in love to Christ and cry out with Ignatius Christ my love is crucified If a friend should die Joh. 10. 17 18. for us how would our hearts be affected with his kindness and shall the God of Glory lay down his life for us and shall we not be affected with his goodness Shall Saul be affected with David's kindness in sparing his life 1 Sam. 24. 16. and shall not we be affected with Christ's kindness who Joh. 1. 18. to save our life lost his own O the infinite love of Christ that he should leave his Fathers bosom and come down Joh. 14. 1 2 3 4. from heaven that he might carry you up to heaven that he that was a Son should take upon him the form of a Phil. 2. 5 6 7 8. servant that you of slaves should be made Sons of enemies should be made friends of heirs of wrath should Rom. 8. 17. be made heirs of God and joynt-heirs with Christ that to save us from everlasting ruine Christ should stick at nothing but be willing to be made flesh to lie in a manger to be tempted deserted persecuted and to die upon a Cross O what flames of love should these things kindle in all our hearts to Christ Love is compared to fire in heaping love upon our enemy we heap coals of Râ—m 12. 19 20. Prov. 26. 21. fire upon his head now the property of fire is to turn all it meets with into its own nature fire maketh all things fire the coal maketh burning coals and is it not a wonder then that Christ having heaped abundance of the fiery coals of his love upon our heads we should yet be but key-cold in our love to him Ah what sad metal are we made of that Christ's fiery love cannot inflame our love to Christ Moses wondred why the Bush Exod. 3. 3. consumed not when he see it all on fire but if you please but to look into your own hearts you shall see a greater wonder for you shall see that though you walk like those three Children in the fiery furnace even in the Dan. 3. midst of Christ's fiery love flaming round about you yet there is but little very little true smell of that sweet fire of love to be felt or found upon you or in you Oh when shall the sufferings of a dear and tender-hearted Saviour kindle such a flame of love in all our hearts as shall still be a breaking forth in our lips and lives in our words and ways to the praise and glory of free Grace Cant. 2. 5. O that the sufferings of a loving Jesus might at last make us all sick of love O let him for ever lie betwixt our Cant. 1. 13. breasts who hath left his Fathers bosom for a time that he might be enbosom'd by us for ever But Thirdly Then in the sufferings of Christ as in a Gospel-glass you may see the odious nature of Sin and accordingly learn to hate it arm against it turn from it and subdue it Sin never appears so odious as when we Psal 119. 104 113 128. Rom. 7. 15. cap. 12. 9. behold it in the â—ed Glass of Christ's sufferings Can we look upon sin as the occasion of all Christ's sufferings can we look upon sin as that which made Christ a curse and that made him forsaken of his Father and that made him live such a miserable life and that brought him to die such a shameful painful and cruel death and our hearts not rise against it Shall our sins be grievous unto Christ and shall they not be odious unto us shall he die for our sins and shall not we die to our sins did not he therefore suffer for sin that we might cease from sin did not he bear our sins in his own body on the tree 1 Pet. 4. 1. that we being dead to sin should live to righteousness If 1 Pet. 2. 24. one should kill our father would we hug and imbrace him as our father no we would be revenged on him Sin hath killed our Saviour and shall we not be reveng'd on it Can a man look upon that Snake that hath stung his dearly beloved spouse to death and preserve it alive warm it at the fire and hug it in his bosom and not rather stab it with a thousand wounds 'T is sin that hath stung our dear Jesus to death that has crucified our Lord clouded his glory and shed his precious blood and oh how should this stir up our indignation against it ah how can a Christian make much of those sins that killed his deared Lord how can he cherish those sins that betrayed Christ and apprehended Christ and bound Christ and condemned Christ and scourged Christ and that violently drew him to the Cross and there murdered him It was neither Judas nor Pilate nor the Jews nor the Souldiers that could have done our Lord Jesus the least hurt had not our sins like so many Butchers and Hangmen come in to their assistance After Julius Caesar was treacherously murthered in the Senate-house Antonius brought forth his Coat all bloody cut and mangled and laying it open to the view of the people said Look here is your Emperors coat and as the bloody conspirators have dealt by it so have they dealt with Caesar's body whereupon the people were all in an uproar and nothing would satisfie them but the death of the murtherers and they run to the houses of the conspirators and burnt them down to the ground But what was Caesar's coat and Caesar's body to the body of our dear Lord Jesus which was all bloody rent and torn for our sins Ah how should this provoke us to be revenged on our sins how should we for ever loath and abhorr them how should our fury be whetted against them how should we labour with all our might to be the death of those sins that have been the death of so great a Lord and will if not prevented be the death of our Souls to all eternity To see God thrust the sword of his pure infinite and incensed wrath through the very heart of his dearest Son notwithstanding all his supplications prayers Heb. 5. 7. tears and strong cries
against God Under the Law if an Oxe gored a man that he died the Exod. 21. 28. Oxe was to be killed Sin hath gored and pierced our dear Lord Jesus O let it die for it O avenge your selves upon it as Sampson did avenge himself upon the Philistines for Judg. 16. 28. his two eyes Pâ—lutarch reports of Marcus Cato that he never declared his opinion in any matter in the Senate but he would close it with this passage Methinks still Carthage should be destroyed so a Christian should never cast his eye upon the Cross of Christ the sufferings of Christ nor upon his sins but his heart should say Methinks pride should be destroyed and unbelief should be destroyed and hypocrisie should be destroyed and earthly-mindedness should be destroyed and self-love should be destroyed and vain glory should be destroyed c. The Jews would not have the pieces of silver which Judas cast down in the Temple put in the Treasury because Maâ— 27. 5 6. they were the price of blood Oh lodg not any one sin in the Treasury of your hearts for they are all the price of blood But Fourthly let the sufferings of our Lord Jesus raise in all our hearts a high estimation of Christ O let us prize a suffering Christ above all our duties and above all our Mat. 10. 37. Luk. 14. 26. graces and above all our privileges and above all our outward contentments and above all our spiritual enjoyments a suffering Christ is a commodity of greater value than all the riches of the Indies yea than all the wealth of the whole world he is better than Rubies saith Prov. 8. 11. Solomon and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared to him he is that Pearl of price which the wise Merchant purchased with all that ever he had no Mat. 13. 46 man can buy such Gold too dear Joseph a type of the Lord Jesus then a precious Jewel of the world was far more precious had the Ishmaelitish Merchants known so Gen. 27. 37. much than all the Balms and Myrrhs that they transported and so is a suffering Christ as all will grant that really know him and that have experienced the sweet of union and communion with him Christ went through heaven and hell life and death sorrow and suffering misery and cruelty and all to bring us to glory and shall we not prize him When in a storm the Nobles of Xerxes were to lighten the ship to preserve their King's life they did their obeysance and leaped into the Sea but our Lord Jesus Christ to preserve our lives Col. 1. 18. our souls he leaps into a Sea of wrath Oh how should this work us to set up Christ above all what a deal ado has there been in the world about Alexander the great and Constantine the great and Pompey the great because of their civil power and authority but what was all their greatness and grandure to that greatness and grandure that God the father put upon our Lord Jesus Christ when Mat 28. 1â— Heb. 1. 13. Eph. 1. 20. he gave all power in heaven and in earth unto him and set him down at his own right hand Oh sirs will you value men according to their titles and will you not highly value our Lord Jesus Christ who has the most magnificent titles given him he is called King of Kings Rev. 17. 14. cap. 19. 16. and Lord of Lords It is observed by learned Drusins that those Titles were usually giâ—â—n to the great Kings of Persia than which there was none assumed more to themselves than they did yet the holy Ghost attributes these great Titles to Christ to let us know that as God hath exalted Christ above all earthly powers so we should magnifie him and exalt him accordingly Paul casting his eye upon a suffering Christ tells us that he esteems of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Phil. 3. 8. all things as nothing in comparison of Christ All things is the greatest account that can be casâ— up for it includeth all prizes all summs it taketh in heaven it taketh in the vast and huge Globe and Circle of the capacious world and all excellencies within its bosom all things includes all Nations All Angels all Gold all Jewels all Honours all delights and every thing else besides and yet the Apostle looks upon all these things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quasi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 micae quae canibus vide à Lapide vide Bezam the original word notes the filth that comes out of the entrails of beasts or off all cast to dogs but as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dung dog's dung as some interpret the word or dogs meat course and contemptible in comparison of dear Jesus Galeacius that noble Italian Marquess was of the same mind and mettal with Paul for when he was strongly tempted and solicited with great summs of money and preferments to return to the Romish Church he gave this heroick answer Cursed be he that prefers all the wealth of the world to one days communion with Christ What if a man had large demains stately buildings and ten thousand rivers of Oyl what if all the mountains of the world were Pearl the mighty Rocks Rubies and the whole Globe a shining Chrysolite yet all this were not to be named in the same day wherein there is mention made of a suffering Christ Look as one Ocean hath more waters than all the rivers in the world and as one Sun hath more light than all the Luminaries in heaven so one suffering Christ is more all to a poor soul than if it had the all of the whole world a thousand times over and over Oh sirs if you cast but your eye upon a suffering Christ a crucified Jesus there you shall find righteousness in him to cover all your sins and plenty enough in him to supply all your wants and grace enough in him to subdue all your lusts and wisdom enouâ—h in him to resolve all your doubts and power enough in him to vanquish all your enemies and vertue enough in him to heal all your diseases Heb. 7. 25. I have read of a Roman servant who knowing his master was sought for by officers to be put to death he put himself into his master's cloaths that he might be taken for him and so he was and was putâ— to death for him whereupon his master in memory of his thankfulness to him and honour of him erected a brazen Statue but what a statue of Gold should we set up in our hearts to the eternal honour exaltation of that Jesus who not in our cloaths but in our very nature hath laid down his life for us and fulness enough in him both to satisfie you and save you and that to the utmost All the good things that can be reckoned up here below have only a finite and limited benignity some can cloath but cannot feed others can
nourish but they cannot heal others can enrich buâ— they cannot secure others can adorn but cannot advance all do serve but none do satisfie they are like a beggars coat made up of many pieces not all enough either to beautifie defend or satisfie but there is enough in a suffering Christ to fill us and satisfie us to the full Christ has the greatest worth and wealth in him Look as the worth and value of many pieces of Silver is to be found in one piece of Gold so all the petty excellencies that are scattered abroad in the creatures we to be found in a bleeding dying Christ yea all the whole volume of perfections which is spread through heaven and earth is epitomized in him that suffered on the Cross nec Christus nec coelum patitur hyperbolen a man cannot hyperbolize in speaking of Christ and heaven but must entreat his hearers as Tully doth his readers concerning the worth of L. Crassus ut majus quiddam de iis quam quae scripta sunt suspicarentur 3. De oratore that they would conceive much more than he was able to express certainly it is as easie to compass the heavens with a span and contein the sea in a nut-shell as to relate fully a suffering Christ's excellencies or heaven's happiness O sirs there is in a crucified Jesus something proportionable to all the straits wants necessities and desires of his poor people He is bread to nourish them and a garment to John 6. 5 6 37. Rev. 13. 14. Mat. 9. 12. Isa 9. 6. Heb. 2. 10. Act. 5. 31. cover and adorn them a Physician to hâ—al them a Counseller to advise them a Captain to defend them a Prince to rule a Prophet to teach and a Priest to make attonement Act. 7. 37 38. Heb. 2. 17 18. cap. 4. 15 16. 2 Cor. 11. 2. Isa 9. 6 7. John 20. 17. Isa 28. 16. Rev. 22. 16. Eph. 1. 22 23. for them an Husband to protect a Father to provide a Brother to relieve a Foundation to support a Root to quicken a Head to guide a Treasure to enrich a Sun to enlighten and a Fountain to cleanse Now what can any Christian desire more to satisfie him and save him to make him holy and happy in both Worlds Shall the Romans and other Nations highly value those that have but ventur'd to lay down their lives for their Countrey and shall not we highly value the Lord Jesus Christ who hath actually laid down his life for his sheep I have John 10. 11 15 17. read of one who walking in the fields by himself of a sudden fell into loud cries and weeping and being asked by one that passed by and over-heard him the cause of his lamentation I weep saith he to think that the Lord Jesus Christ should do so much for us men and yet not one man of a thousand so much as mind him or think of him Oh what a bitter Lamentation have we cause to take up that the Lord Jesus Christ has suffered so many great and grievous things for poor sinners and that there are so few that sincerely love him or that highly value him most men preferring their lusts or else the Toys and Trifles of this world above him But Fifthly let the sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ work us all into a gracious willingness to embrace sufferings for his sake and chearfully and resolutely to take up his Cross Mat. 16. 24. and follow him did Christ suffer who knew no sin and shall we think it strange to suffer who know nothing but sin shall he lie swelthering under his father's wrath and shall we cry out of men's anger was he crowned Godfrey of Bullen first King of Jerusalem refused to be crowned with a Crown of Gold saying that it became not a Christian to wear a Crown of Gold where Christ for our salvation had worn a Crown of thorns with thorns and must we be crowned with rose-buds was his whole life from the cradle to the cross made up of nothing but sorrows and sufferings and must our lives from the cradle to the grave be filled up with nothing but pleasures and delights was he despised and must we be admired was he debased and must we be exalted was he poor and must we be rich was he low and must we be high did he drink of a bitter cup a bloody cup and will no cups serve our turns but cups of consolation Let us not think any thing too much to do for Christ nor any thing too great to suffer for Christ nor any thing too dear to part with for such a Christ such a Saviour that thought nothing too much to do or too grievous to suffer that so he might accomplish the work of our Redemption He left heaven for us and shall not John 1. 18. we let go this world for him he left his father's bosom for us and shall not we leave the bosoms of our dearest Relations Psal 45. 10 11. Mat. 10. 37. for him he underwent all sorts of sufferings for us let us as readily encounter with all sorts of sufferings for him Paul was so inur'd to sufferings for Christ that â— Cor. 12. 10. 2 Cor. 11. 23 to verse 28. he could rejoice in his sufferings he gloried most in his chains and he looked upon his scars buffetings scourgings stoneings for Christ as his greatest triumphs And how ambitious were the primitive Christians of Martyrdom in the cause of Christ and of late in the times of the Marian Persecution how many hundreds chearfully and willingly laid down their lives mounting Eliah-like to heaven in fiery charriots And oh how will Christ own and honour such Christians at last as have Rev. 3. 21. not set on others but exposed themselves to hazards losses and sufferings for his sake as those brave souls who Rev. 12. 11. loved not their lives unto the death that is the despised their lives in comparison of Christ they exposed their Heb. 11 33 to 39. cap. 10. 34. bodies to horrible and painful deaths their temporal estates to the spoyl and their persons to all manner of shame and contempt for the cause of Christ in the days of that bloody persecutor Dioclesian the Christians shewed certatim Ploâ—iosa in certamina ruebatur c. Sulpitius as glorious power in the faith of Martyrdom as in the faith of Miracles the valour of the patients and the savageness of the persecutors striving together till both exceeding nature and belief bred wonder and astonishment in beholders and readers In all Ages and Generations they that have been born after the flesh have persecuted Gal. 4. 29. them that have been born after the spirit and the seed of the serpent have been still a multiplying of troubles upon the seed of the woman Would any man take the Churches picture saith Luther then let him paint a poor silly maid sitting in a wilderness compassed about with hungry
readiness and resoluteness whatsoever calamities or miseries may attend us for Christ's sake or the Gospel's sake Ah what a shame would it be if we should â—ot be always ready to suffer any thing for his sake who hath suffered so much for our sins as is beyond all conception all expression Never was Jacob more gracious and acceptable to his father Isaac than when he stood before him cloathed in the garments of his rough brother Esau then the father smelling the savour of the elder Gen. 27. 27. brothers garments said Behold the smell of my son is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed And never are we more gracious and acceptable to our heavenly father than when we stand before him cloathed in the rough garments of Christ's afflictions and sufferings Oh Christians all your sufferings for Christ they are but in lets to your glorious reigning with Christ Justin Martyr saith that when the Romans did immortalize their Emperours as they called it they brought one to swear that he see him go to Heaven out of the fire but we may see by an eye of faith the blessed souls of Martyrs fly to heaven like Elias in his fiery charriot or like the Angel that appeared to Manoah in the flames By the consent of the School-men all Martyrs shall appear in the Church triumphant bearing the signs of their Christian wounds about them as so many speaking testimonies of their holy courage that what here they endured in the behalf of their Saviour may be there an addition to their glory But Sixthly hath Jesus Christ suffered such great and grievous things for you Oh then in all your fears doubts and conflicts with enemies within or without fly to the sufferings of Christ as your City of refuge Did Christ endure a most ignominious death for thee did he take on him thy sinful person and bare thy sin and death and cross and was made a sacrifice and curse for thee Oh then in all thy inward and outward distresses shelter Psal 90. 1. Psal 91. 1 4 9. thy self under the wings of a suffering Christ I have read of Nero that he had a shirt made of a Salamander's skin so that if he went through the fire in it it would keep him from burning Oh sirs a suffering Christ is this Salamander's skin that will keep the Saints from burning in the midst of burning from suffering in the Dan. 3. 24. 29. Isa 43. 2. midst of sufferings from drowning in the midst of drowning In all the storms that beat upon your inward or your outward man eye the sufferings of Christ lâ—an upon Zach. 13. 10. Cant. 8. 5. 2 Cor. 2. 14. Eph. 6. 14. the sufferings of Christ plead the sufferings of Christ and triumph in the sufferings of Christ It is storied of a Martyr that writing to his wife where she might find him when he was fled from home oh my dear said he Surius in vita sancti Elzearii if thou desirest to see me seek me in the side of Christ in the cleft of the rock in the hollow of his wounds for there I have made my nest there will I dwell there shalt thou find me and no where else but there In every temptation let us look up to a crucified Christ who is fitted Heb. 2. 17 18. cap. 4. 15 16. and qualified to succour tempted souls oh my soul when ever thou art assaulted let the wounds of Christ be thy City of refuge whither thou maist fly and live Let us learn in every tentation which presseth us whether it be sin or death or curse or any other evil to translate it from our selves to Christ and all the good in Christ let us learn to translate it from Christ to our selves Look as the Burgess of a Town or Corporation sitting in the Parliament house beareth the persons of that whole Town or place and what he saith the whole Town saith and what is done to him is done to the whole Town even so Christ upon the cross stood in our Isa 53. 4 5 6. place and bare our sins and whatsoever he suffered we suffered and when he died all the faithful died with him and in him I have read of a gracious woman who being by Satan strongly tempted replyed Satan if thou hast any thing to say to me say it to my surety who has undertaken all for me who hath paid all my debts and satisfied Divine Justice and set all reckonings even between God and my soul Do your sins terrifie you oh then look up to a crucified Saviour who bare your sins in his own body on the Tree 1 Pet. 2. 24. When sin stares you in the face oh then turn your face The strongest Antidote against sin is to look upon sin in the red glass of Christ's blood Auâ—tin to a dying Jesus and behold him with a spear in his side with thorns in his head with nails in his feet and a pardon in his hands Hast thou wounded thy conscience by any great fall or falls O then remember that there is nothing in heaven or earth more efficacious to cure the Bern. Ser. 61. in cant wounds of conscience than a frequent and serious meditation on the wounds of Christ Doth death that rides upon the pale horse look gashly and deadly upon thee Rev. 6. 8. Rom. 5. 6 8. oh then remember that Christ died for you and that by his death he hath swallowed up death in victory Oh 1 Cor. 15. 55 56 57. remember that a crucified Christ hath stripped death of his sting and disarmed it of all its destroying power death may buzz about our ears but it can never sting our souls Look as a crucified Christ hath taken away the guilt of sin though he hath not taken away sin it self so he hath taken away the sting of death though he hath not taken away death it self He spake excellently that said that is not death but life wbich joyns the dying man to Christ Ambrosius in 1 Tim. 5. 6. Death will blow the bud of Grace into the flower of Glory and that is not life but death that separates the living man from Christ Austin longed to die that he might see that head that was crowned with thorns Did Christ die for me saith one that I might live with him I will not therefore desire to live long from him all men go willingly to see him whom they love and shall I be unwilling to die that I may see him whom my soul loves Bernard would have us never to let go out of our minds the thoughts of a crucified Christ let these says he be meat and drink unto you let them be your sweetness and consolation your honey and your desire your reading and your meditation your contemplation your life death and resurrection certainly he that shall live up to this counsel will look upon the King of terrors as the King of desires Are
Fourthly know for your comfort that this imputed righteousness of Christ will answer to all the fears doubts and objections of your souls How shall I look up to God the answer is in the righteousness of Jesus Christ how shall I have any communion with a holy God in this world the answer is in the righteousnâ—ss of Christ How shall I find acceptance with God the answer is in the righteousness of Christ How shall I die the answer is in the righteousness of Christ How shall I stand before a Judgment seat the answer is in the righteousness of Jesus Christ Your sure and only way under all temptations fears conflicts doubts and disputes is by faith to remember Christ and the sufferings of Christ as your Mediator and Surety and say Oh Christ thou art my sin in being made sin for me and thou art my curse being â— Coâ— 5. 21. â—al 3. 13. made a curse for me or rather I am thy sin and thou art my rightcousness I am thy curse and thou art my blessing I am thy death and thou art my life I am the wrath of God to thee and thou art the love of God to me I am thy hell and thou art my heaven Oh sirs if you think of your sins and of God's wrath if you think of your guiltiness and of God's justice your hearts will faint and fail they will fear and tremble and sink into despair if you do not think of Christ if you do not stay and rest your souls upon the mediatory righteousness of Christ The Imputed Righteousness of Christ The Imputed Righteousness of Christ answers all cavils and objections though there were millions of them that can be made against the good estate of a believer This is a precious truth more worth than a world that all our sins are pardoned not only in a way of truth and mercy but in a way of justice Satan and our own consciences will object many things against our souls if we plead only the mercy and the truth of God and will be ready to say oh but where is then the justice of God can mercy pardon without the consent of his justice but now whilst we rest upon the satisfaction of Christ justice and mercy kiss Psal 85. 10. each other yea justice saith I am pleased in a day of temptation many things will be cast in our dish about the multitude of our sins and the greatness of our sins and the grievousness of our sins and about the circumstances and aggravations of our sins but that good word Christ hath redeemed us from all iniquities he hath paid Titus 2. 14. the full price that justice could exact or require and that good word mercy rejoyceth against judgment may James 2. 13. support comfort and bear us up under all The infinite worth of Christ's obedience did arise from the dignity of his person who was God-man so that all the obedience of Angels and men if put together could not amount to the excellency of Christ's satisfaction The righteousness of Christ is often called the righteousness of God because it is a righteousness of God's providing and a righteousness that God is fully satisfied with and therefore no fears no doubts no cavils no objections no disputes can stand before this blessed and glorious righteousness of Jesus Christ that is imputed to us But Fifthly know for your comfort that the imputed righteousness of Christ is the best title that you have to shew for a Kingdom that shakes not for riches that corrupt not Heb. 12. 28. 1 Pet. 1 3 4 5. 2 Cor. 5. 1 2 3 4 for an inheritance that fadeth not away and for an house not made with bands but one eternal in the heavens 'T is the fairest certificate that you have to shew for all that happiness and blessedness that you look for in that other world The righteousness of Christ is your life your joy your comfort your crown your confidence your heaven your all oh that you were still so wise as to keep a fixed eye and an awakened heart upon the mediatory righteousness of Christ for that 's the righteousness by which you may safely and comfortably live and by which you may happily and quietly die It was a very sweet and golden confession which Bernard made when he thought Guliel Aâ—bas in vâ—ta Bern. lib. 1. cap. 12. himself to be at the point of death I confess said he I am not worthy I have no merits of mine own to obtain heaven by but my Lord had a double right thereunto an hereditary right as a son and a meritorious right as a sacrifice he was contented with the one right himself the other right he hath given unto me by the vertue of which gift I do rightly lay claim unto it and am not confounded ah that believers would dwell much upon this that they have a righteousness in Christ that is as full perfect and compleat as if they had fulfilled the Law Christ being the end of the Law for righteousness to believers invests believers with a righteousness every way as compleat as the personal obedience of the Law would Rom. 8. 3 4. have invested them withal yea the righteousness that believers have by Christ is in some respect better than that they should have had by Adam 1. Because of the dignity of Christ's person he being the son of God his righteousness is more glorious than Adam's was his righteousness is called the righteousness of God and we are made the 2 Cor. 5. 21. righteousness of God in him The first Adam was a mere man the second Adam is God and man 2. Because the righteousness is perpetual Adam was a mutable person he lost his righteousness in one day say some and all that glory which his posterity should have possessed had he stood fast in innocency But the righteousness of Christ cannot be lost his righteousness is like himself from everlasting to everlasting 't is an everlasting righteousness when once this white rayment is put upon a believer it Dâ—n 9. 24. can never fall off it can never be taken off This splendid glorious righteousness of Jesus Christs is as really a Rev. 19. 8. believers as if he had wrought it himself A believer is no loser but a gainer by Adam's fall by the loss of Adam's righteousness is brought to light a more glorious and durable righteousness than ever Adam's was and upon the account of an interest in this righteousness a believer may challenge all the glory of that upper world But Sixthly know for your comfort that this imputed righteousness of Christ is the only true basis bottom and ground for a believer to build his happiness upon his joy and comfort upon and the true peace and quiet of his conscience upon what though Satan or thy own heart or the world condemns thee yet in this thou maist rejoyce that God justifies thee you see what a bold challenge Paul
Christ which is infinitely better than our own yea better than our very lives may I not say yea better than our very souls The branch Christ Jesus is called Jehovah Tsidkenu the Lord our righteousness Jer. 23. 6. And this is his name whereby he shall be called THE LORD OVR RIGHTEOVSNESS Where note first to be called by this name is to be so really for Christ is never called what he is not and so he is to the same purpose elsewhere Mat. 1. 23. called Immanuel God with us that is he shall be so indeed God with us so here he shall be called the Lord our righteousness that is he shall be so indeed Secondly observe this is one of his glorious names that is one of his Attributes which he accounts his excellency and his glory Now all the attributes of Christ are unchangeable so that he can as easily change his nature as his name Now remember that this imputed righteousness of Christ procures acceptance for our inherent righteousness when a sincere Christian casts his eye upon the weaknesses infirmities and imperfections that daily attend his best services he sighs and mourns but if he looks upward to the Imputed Righteousness of Jesus Christ that shall bring forth his infirm weak and sinful performances perfect spotless and sinless and approved according to the tenour of the Gospel so that they become spiritual sacrifices he cannot 1 Pet. 2. 5. but rejoyce For as there is an imputation of righteousness to the persons of believers so there is also an imputation to their services and actions As the fact of Psal 106. 31. Phineas was imputed to him for righteousness so the imperfect good works that are done by believers are accounted righteousness or as Calvin speaks are accounted for righteousness they being dipped in the blood of Christ tincta sanguine Christi i. e. they are accounted righteous actions and so sincere Christians shall be judged Rev. 11. 18. cap. 20. 12. Mat. 25. 34 35 36 37. according to their good works though not saved for them And 't is observable in that famous process of the last judgment that the supreme judge makes mention of the bounty and liberality of the Saints and so bestows the Crown of life and the eternal inheritance upon them so that though the Lord 's faithful ones have eminent cause to be humbled and afflicted for the many weaknesses that cleaves to their best duties yet on the other hand they have wonderful cause to rejoyce and triumph Heb. 13. 20 21. 1 Cor. 6 11. Mal. 4. 2. that they are made perfect through Jesus Christ and that the Lord looks at them through the righteousness of Christ as fruits of his own spirit The Sun of Righteousness hath healing enough in his wings for all our spiritual Maladies The Saints prayers being perfumed with Rev. 8. 3 4. Christ's odours are highly accepted in heaven Upon this bottom of Imputed Righteousness believers may have exceeding strong consolation and good hope through grace that both their persons and services do find singular acceptation with God as having no spot or blemish at all in them Surely Righteousness imputed must be the top of our happiness and blessedness Rom. 4 5 6. But Ninthly and lastly know for your comfort that Imputed Righteousness will give you the greatest boldness before God's Judgment-seat There is an absolute and indispensible necessity of a perfect Righteousness wherewith to appear before God The holiness of God's nature the righteousness of his Government the severity of his Law and the terrour of wrath calls aloud upon the sinner for a compleat Righteousness without which Psal 1. 5. there is no standing in judgment That Righteousness only is able to justifie us before God which is perfect and that hath no defect nor blemish in it such as may abide the tryal before his Judgment-seat such as may fitly satisfie his justice and make our peace with him and consequently such as whereby the Law of God is fulfilled Therefore it is called the Righteousness of God such a Rom. 10. 3. Righteousness as he requires as will stand before him and satisfie his justice so the Apostle saith The righteousness Rom. 8. 4. of the Law must be fulfilled in us Now there is no other Righteousness under heaven whereby the Law of God was ever perfectly fulfilled but by the righteousness of Christ alone no righteousness below the Righteousness of Christ was ever able to abide the tryal at God's judgment-seat and fully to satisfie his justice and pacifie his wrath A gracious soul triumphs more in the Righteousness of Christ Imputed than he would have done if he could have stood in the Righteousness in which he was created This is the crowning comfort to a sensible and understanding soul that he stands righteous before a Judgment-seat in that full exact perfect compleat matchless spotless pearless and most acceptable Righteousness of Christ imputed to him The Righteousness Râ—m 3. 21 22. cap. 10 3. â—hil 3. 9. of Christ is therefore called the Righteousness of God because it is it which God hath assigned and which God doth accept for us in our justification and for and in which he doth acquit and pronounce us righteous before his seat of Justice There is an indispensible necessity that lies upon the sinner to have such a Righteousness to his justification as may render his appearance safe and comfortable in the day of Judgment Now there is no righteousness that can abide that day of fiery tryal but the Righteousness of Christ imputed to us Paul that great Apostle had as fair and as full a Certificate to shew Phil. 3. 4 5 6. Act. 23 6. 2 Cor. 11. 22. for a legal Justification as any person under heaven had but yet he durst not stand by that righteousness he durst not plead that righteousness he durst not appear in that righteousness before the dreadful Judgment-seat But oh how earnest how importunate is he that he may be found in that great day of the Lord in the Mediatory Righteousness Phil. 3. 9 10. of Christ and not in his own personal righteousness which he looked upon as filthy rags as dross dung dogs meat the great thing that he most strongly insists up on is that he might be clothed with the Robe of Christ's Righteousness for then he knew that the Law could not say black was his eye and that the Judge upon the Bench would pronounce him righteous and bid him enter into the joy of his Lord a joy too great to enter into Mat. 25. 21 23 24 him and therefore he must enter into that when the match is made up between Christ and the soul that soul bears her sovereigns name The spouse of the first Adam and her husband had both one name God called their Gen. 5. 2. name Adam in the day that he made them so the Spouse of the second Adam in the change of her