yea a glorious light that is to say great and sparkling Why then saith he that the treasures of wisdom are hid in Him whereas it seemeth he should say on the contrary that they are manifested in Him that they shine out and appear clearly in Him I answer that the one and the other may be said in divers respects For if you consider the thing in its self the treasures of wisdom are manifested to us in JESUS CHRIST and there is no purifyed Soul but sees them in Him and acknowledgeth them immediately when it views Him as the Gospel represents Him But if you have respect to the eyes and perceptions of men as they naturally are even obscured and corrupted by Sin I confess it 's hard for them to discern in JESUS CHRIST the riches of wisdom and knowledg which the Father hath put in Him and that this proceeds in part from that veil of meanness and infirmity wherewith He is as it were covered all over And this makes S. Paul say elswhere that CHRIST crucified whom He preached was to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness though to the faithful who were called He was the Power and the Wisdom of GOD. Therefore it being necessary for our Salvation that He should be born and live poorly on earth and there suffer in the end the death of the Cross which surpassed all others for cruelty and ignominy the Father who sent Him in this form cloath'd with this sad and shameful mantle that assrighteth men hath both manifested and hidden His treasures in Him He hath manifested them in Him since it is in Him and by Him that He exhibiteth to us whatsoever we ought to know for the attainment of Salvation He hath hidden them in Hun since He hath covered this treasure with such a veil as by its poor and contemptible look discourageth men and makes them say as Isaiah prophecyed He hath no form nor comeliness in Him and when we see Him there is no beauty that we should desire Him But they which have their eyes purified by light from on high do discern under this appearing simplicity and humility all coelestial riches in their stateliest and most glorious form This is the Apostle's meaning here when he saith that these treasures are hid in CHRIST He advertiseth us that we must not stop at that infirmity and emptiness which appeareth at first sight in Him and disgusteth vain and earthly spirits but look within and contemplate the great wonders which GOD hath there manifested for our compleat instruction and consolation Hitherto we have examin'd the words of this Text. It remaineth that we now consider the truth in it We shall do it but summarily For the prosecution of this rich subject in its whole extent is above the ability of Man or Angel to be worthily performed so great is the heighth and depth of it But we will briefly touch its chief heads Mans true wisdom in his present state is to know His misery with the means to escape it and his felicity with the way that he must take to attain it As for our misery nature indeed hath given us some perception of it there being scarce a man in the world who sees not some depravation and irregularity in himself and whose conscience doth not reproach him with his faults and threaten the judgment of a supream justice The Law hath taught us much more of it representing GOD unto us as armed with inexorable severity against sinners and fulminating his curse upon them But beside that these knowledges are weak and are easily smothered in security there is this sorrow with them that having shewed us our misery they do not inform us of the remedy so as if they be necessary to draw us out of that folly wherein the most are plunged who confidently sleep amid the tempest and presume they are well while they have a mortal impostume in their brain or in their bowels yet it cannot be said that they suffice to make us wise seeing that for the just possession of this title a man must know not only his malady but also the means to cure it And yet though we knew it too nevertheless this would not be sufficient because besides deliverance from evil we desire also the fruition of good yea the chief Good But neither the light of nature nor even the light of the Law does reveal to us what this supream felicity is which without distinct knowing it we do desire so far are they from shewing us the way to it But in JESUS CHRIST as proposed to us in the Gospel these Verities that are necessary to render us wise are found clearly and fully all of them For as to our misery He declareth it exactly to us not by some surd and inarticulate sounds as nature doth nor by circuitions and essaies as the Law did but by the fullest and most moving way of information that ever was in the world even crying aloud to us from that Cross to which our sins had nailed Him Behold ye sons of men how horrid your crimes are since that it was necessary for the washing them away that I should come down from the Heavens shed forth my blood Behold how great irreparable your fall was since there was none in heaven or earth that could raise you up again but my self As much as the life of the Son of GOD is more precious than the life of all mankind so much clearer is the proof which his death giveth us of the horror of sin than that which we might take from the death of all that ever sinned though we should we see them stricken down together and punished by the avenging justice of GOD. But if this great Saviour do make us so feelingly perceive the horridness of our misery his end is only to make us the more ardently desire and embrace the remedy which he offereth us fully prepared from that same Cross to which he He was fastned for us I grant that the forbearance and kindness of GOD in his conduct of men though sinful might give them some sparkle of hope and his promises under the old Covenant had highly confirm'd it betimes But the Sword of his Justice dreadfully flaming in the hand of the Law perplexed them not a little and it was very difficult for them to accord His inflexible righteousness with the mercy that was necessary for them JESUS CHRIST hath removed all these difficulties and exhibiteth unto us in his Cross the solution of all our doubts Fear nothing sinner I saith he have contented the Justice of God and satisfied his Law Boldly trust his promises and approach his Throne with full assurance This blood which hath opened to you the entrance thither is not the blood of a beast nor an earthly ransome it is the blood of GOD a ransome of infinite value more than sufficient to take away your sins how infinite soever the demerit of them be But you will say This
of our Brethren Be not asrighted Christians at the Apostle's telling you in the entrance that ye are dead This death which he attributeth unto you is gain and not loss a donative from GOD's grace and not an effect of His wrath or an execution of His justice I grant that every death is the privation of some life that was possessed But since there are miserable and execrable lives it must be confess'd that every death is not a calamity For to be rid of a thing that harms us is not a calamity but a comfort It 's an advantage and not a damage to be deprived of a poyson and devested of an habit of malediction The death of which the Apostle speaks is not the destroying of that happy life which the Creator gave us at the beginning to be led within Paradise in a continual execise of the original justice and rectitude of our nature and in the sweet and innocent fruition of the goods of the first world It 's the first Adam and not the second that outed us of this life and as we did receive it in his person so we have lost it by his crime being heirs of his misery as well as of his sin The life which is extinguished in us by the death here intended of the Apostle is that corrupted and sin-infected life which we have received from our first parents by carnal generation a life contrary to the will of GOD and meriting His wrath and obnoxious to His curse the operation of an empoysoned nature and the acting of a blind understanding a perverse will and an irregular affection the continual flux of an abominable pest which in the course of nature could not otherwise determine than in an eternal death It 's that which Scripture calleth the life of the old man that is of this altogether depraved and corrupted nature which we derive from Adam and which through error in its false wisdom placing its felicity in the enjoyment of earthly things adhereth to them with inordinate desire and doth not act or labour but to acquire the same pursuing them with such a violent ardour that there is not any thing so holy so just and so honest but it violates the same to attain its end This is the life that the LORD JESUS destroyeth in all His true members and in regard of which His holy Apostle saith and meaneth here that we are dead The death whereof he speaks is nothing else but the privation of this pernicious and accursed life the abolition of its principles and the destroying of the habitudes on which it doth depend We are dead because entring into the communion of JESUS CHRIST we have put off this first life which was natural carnal and terrene and consisted in a perverse and vitious re-search and fruition of the perishing things of this old world that goeth to perdition And this is it he teacheth us again in so many other places as when he saith 2 Cor. 5.14 15 16. Rom 6. that Old things are pass'd away that CHRIST having died for all all are also dead that they may not live henceforth unto themselves and again We are dead with CHRIST buried with Him by baptisme into His death made one and the same plant with Him by the likeness of His death that Our old man was crucified with Him that the body of sin might be destroyed and else-where that they that are CHRIST's Gal. 5.24 have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts and it 's the same thing that he called afore the circumcision of CHRIST Col. 2.11 and the putting off the body of the flesh the same again that he represents other-where in His own person when he saith that he is crucified with CHRIST Gal. 2.19 20. 6.14 and that it is no more himself that liveth but CHRIST who liveth in him and that the world is crucified unto him and he unto the World And it 's the same too that St. Peter understands 1 Pet. 4.1 2. when he saith that we have suffered with CHRIST in the flesh that we should live the rest of our time in the flesh no more after the lusts of men Behold me that penitent woman whose history you have in the Gospel Before she had seen the LORD she was an harlot that liv'd in nothing but filth and had neither action nor thought but for the lusts of the flesh But after she had heard the word of JESUS and felt the efficacy of His Spirit she soon lost all that former life of hers She hath now no longer that wanton and wicked heart those unchaste looks those impure desires Psal 45.6 Acts 9.1 In vain seek you in her that debauched person that liv'd in infamy before That person is no more there but is dead The sharpned arrows of the King of glory have penetrated her heart and slain her Behold me our Paul before his conversion He was a furious wild boar inflam'd unto threatnings and slaughter breathing out nothing but blood and butcheries a murtherer animated by pride and cruelty Spake JESUS to him on the way to Damascus His word like a two-edged sword pierced this fierce and unruly persecutor He struck him dead or to say better destroyed and consumed him all in a moment Seek not Saul in him any longer that so fierce and cruel man He 's no more there He is dead and so throughly dead that you shall not find in him any print of what he was before Again take me a view of those Pagans of Colosse of Ephesus of Athens and of other places who were converted by his ministery Before they were idolaters breaking out into all kind of vices their life was nothing but a continual practise of superstition and impiety of avarice and ambition of envy cruelty and injustice Now when they have passed through the victorious hand of the LORD JESUS you see no more any such thing in them He hath extinguish'd in them all the life of this kind that they had Those idolaters and ungodly wretches those epicures and robbers which lived in their persons heretofore are all dead They are new men of another quality in whom none of that they were before remaineth any longer In sine there is not one of the truly faithful and living members of JESUS CHRIST but hath undergone this death the flesh hath been slain in him and the old man pierced nailed and crucified upon the cross of the Son of GOD. I acknowledge that so long as they are on earth they still resent the efforts and attempts of this old man and that combat of the flesh lusting against the spirit Gal. 5.17 which the Apostle else-where speaks of Yet I affirm that this hinders not but that true believers may be said even for the present to be dead in regard of the flesh and the flesh dead in them First because sentence of it is given in the judgement of GOD who hath in His eternal counsel determined
flesh that is to say of the flesh of His CHRIST by His death There is no one of these words but is of very great weight First mentioning here the body of our LORD he intimateth to us the mysterie of His Incarnation As if he had said that GOD loved us to such a degree as He would have His own Son become man to re-unite and reconcile us with Himself He would have this Divine person whose essence is spiritual and infinite assume a visible and finite body He shews us also by this word the sacrifice by which the wrath of GOD was appeased and our crimes expiated For it is properly for this that the Son of GOD had a body as the Apostle teacheth us when opposing this body of the LORD to sacrifices of living creatures that were unprofitable and incapable of satisfying the Justice of the Father he brings Him in saying Sacrifice and burnt-offering thou wouldst not have Heb. 10.5 10. but a body hast thou prepared me and adjoyneth that it is by the once offering up of this body we have been sanctified But the Apostle doth not say simply the body of CHRIST he addeth the body of His flesh that is according to the stile of the Hebrews His fleshy body His body of flesh At first blush you may seem that this addition is needless and to no purpose But it 's much otherwise For in the language of Scripture every Body is not flesh It gives this name only to an infirm a passible and mortal body He means therefore that the LORD to reconcile us not only assumed a body which yet is very marvelous but that He took a feeble and mortal body a body sustaining it self by meat and drink a body like ours and subject to all their meannesses and infirmities A consideration that as you see exceedingly heightens both the excellency of His love towards us and the value of the means by which He reconciled us it so being that the King of glory who is the Author and Mediator of this work vested Himself with poor Flesh to compass His design And this is the reason why the sacred writers so often use this word to signifie our LORD's humane nature as when they say 1 Tim. 3. Joh. 2. Heb. 2.14 that GOD was manifested in the flesh that the word was made flesh that the Son did partake of flesh and blood Indeed this qualification of the body of CHRIST was necessary for the expiating of our sins since this could not be effected but by sufferings of which only a fleshy body is capable Whence it comes that in the sixth Chapter of St. John where Himself speaketh of the vertue He hath to quicken us He also useth these very words saying that His flesh is meat indeed and His blood drink indeed and that He will give His flesh for the life of the world This word is the cause that I understand this passage of the natural body of CHRIST and not of His mystical body to which it seems some do refer it I acknowledge that the LORD receiveth into the union of His mystical body that is of His Church all those that applying to themselves the promises of His Gospel by Faith are effectually reconciled to GOD. Yet this is not the body the Apostle meaneth here since the body he speaks of is the body of the Flesh of the LORD which cannot be affirmed of His mystical body His saying therefore that GOD hath reconciled us in His body must be taken as if he had said by His body For as we have often informed you 't is ordinary in the stile of Scripture to put in for by And hence appears how extravagant the imagination of some ancient hereticks was who did dogmatize that JESUS CHRIST had but a vain and false appearance of a body and not a real solid and true body as also the errour of those who confessed He had a true body but held it to be celestial and of a quite other matter and substance than ours are The Apostle confounds these foolish phancies by terming the body of our LORD the body of His flesh In fine having said that we were reconciled by the body of His Flesh the Apostle addeth in the last place by His death It was not enough oh faithful brethren that the King of glory the Prince of life assumed to Himself a body and even a body of flesh vile and infirm as yours To reconcile you unto GOD it was necessary He should dye His flesh would have profited you nothing if it had not suffered that death which you deserved But of this death of the LORD and of its necessity and of its efficacy we have spoken largely upon the Texts foregoing Here we will only remark two things before we go further The first is that CHRIST did satisfie the Justice of His Father for us since it is by His death that He reconciled us For except this be asserted it is evident His death will have contributed nothing to our reconciliation in respect of that he would have dyed for nought Grant that there was need He should dye for the confirming of His doctrine and to give us an example of patience though to say true this reason if there were no other seemeth not so necessary that it should have obliged the Son of GOD to dye Yet still after this account His death will have contributed nothing to our reconciliation with the Father Him His own mercy alone and not any consideration of this death would have appeased towards us And nevertheless the Apostle saith expresly we were reconciled by that death which the LORD suffered in the body of His flesh Sure then it must be acknowledged that it quenced the wrath of the Father that is to say satisfied His justice for us The other particular which I would remark here is that the body of the LORD made propitiation of our sins only as it was infirm flesh that suffered death Every one confesseth that now He dyeth no more yea that He is invested with a soveraign glory having for ever put off the infirmity and mortality of the flesh Certainly then it is vainly and without reason that some do imagine His body is offered still to this day for the reconciling of sinners unto GOD. It 's by death Rom 6.9 that He hath reconciled us saith St. Paul And being now raised from the dead He dyeth no more saith he elsewhere But I come to the third and last article of our Text wherein the Apostle saith that it is to make us holy and without spot and unreprovable before Him that GOD hath reconciled us by the death of His Son It is strictly in the original to present us or to make us stand and appear before Him holy without spot and unreprovable which hath given occasion to some of our Expositors to referr these words also to our Justification before GOD as if the Apostle meant that He made our peace and abolished the
to come But at the bottom and in themselves they contained no such thing in effect On the contrary they were so many obligations upon a sinner openly testifying that he stood obnoxious to the Justice of GOD. For the aspersions and purifications that were made by washing or pouring water upon men did evidently shew that such as receiv'd them were defiled and unclean And Circumcision was a publick confession of the impurity of our nature which did declare that it needed to be cut or retrenched And they that offer'd Beasts to be slain for sacrifices did by that very act acknowledg they had deserved death Those that observ'd the Fasts and other mortifications of the Law did protest they were unworthy to use the Creatures of GOD. And thus it was in the rest of their Ceremonies All their devotions of this nature were either images of the punishment they deserved or an avouchment of their guiltiness and so many proofs and convictions of their sin For to imagine that these carnal Ceremonies did truly expiate their offences was not possible for them to do both by reason of the absurdity and extravagancy of the thing it self and also for that GOD had a thousand times advertised them of the contrary by the mouth of his Prophets So you see in my opinion clearly how all the Law of Moses was no other than an obligation against us an instrument of our condemnation an evidence of our sin and a justification of our punishment Wherefore the Apostle elsewhere calleth it in the same sense and for the same reason the ministration of death 2 Cor. 3.7 9. and of condemnation because in effect it did properly serve only to form and prosecute and finish the sinners arraignment as affording full demonstration both of his guilt and of the penalty due to him giving in evidence concerning his crimes and making known the Justice of GOD in judging and punishing him And hereto must be refer'd what he elsewhere notifies namely Rom. 3 7. Gd. 3 1â— Rom. 7. â— that by the law was given the knowledg of sin and that it was added because of transgression and again that without the law he had not known sin As for what the Apostle addeth here in the second place That this obligation of which he speaks doth lye in Ordinances we have touched at it already and referred it to that large multitude of Commandments wherein it consisteth For I do not see that any thing doth oblige us to restrain this clause to the Ordinâ—â—â—â—s of the Ceremonial Law as some do It comprehendeth generally all that the Law Ordains of what kind or rank soever it be And it seems to me that the Apostle's scope and aim doth so require For he urgeth GOD's having â—bolish'd that obligation which consisted in Ordinances to prove that he hath freely pâ—â—doned our offences which he had been saying Why and how 〈◊〉 Because saith heâ— or inasmuch as he hath cancell'd by the cross of his Son the obligation that was against us Verily it seemeth that this reason will be beside the purpose if the obligation that was made void were not that of the whole Law as the offences which have been forgiven us in consequence of the abolishing of this obligation are generally all sins committed against any part of the Law whichsoever and not only transgrâ—ssions of the Ceremonial Ordinances And whereas the Apostle in the following Verses doth argue from this Doctrine against the Ceremonies only who knoweth not that it is ordinary to reason from the whole unto one of the parts As when elsewhere in the Epistle to the Galatians having laid it down in general that the Law of Mâ—ses cannot at all justifie us he thence inferreth against the seducers that by câ—nsequence neither circumcision nor the other ceremonies can have this virtue just as in this place having setled this principle that the Mosaick Law was abolish'd by the Cross of our Saviour he afterwards doth with reason thence conclude that we are no longer obliged to its ancient Ceremoniâ—s But the Apostle saith in the third place that this obligation whereof he speaks was contrary to us This as you see doth also suit well with the Law Of it self I confess it is good and holy and prontable and salutiferous unto man as that that would lead him unto â—e But it is become contrary to us through cause of sin whereof we are all guilty For it serves to convict us of it as an Obligation which being produc'd in judgment stops the mouth of an unfaithful Debtor It is as it were our Adversary that impleadeth us and lays open our crimes and brings upon us that condemnation to which we have submitted in accepting and signing it And as for its Ceremonies besides that they witnessed the sin of those who practis'd them as we have said they were also contrary to us in another kind even as putting a new yoak upon us which through their vast multitude and diversity was heavy and unsupportable Yâ—t it must be observed that this seems not to be properâ—y the thing which the Apostle intends here the word he makes use of in the Original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying that this obligation was not simply contrary to us but contrary in some sort I think then that by this word he prevents an Objection that might be made him For though the Law might some one say be an obligation against us yet is it nevertheless useful since it sheweth us our sin and misery and by that means forceth us to have recourse to the mercy of GOD that we may seek our salvation in his Grace alone which was in effect the true end for which GOD gave it to the Israelites The Apostle granting this as a truth doth affirm That this obligation was notwithstanding in some fort contrary to us For first It telling us only of obeying or being punished and thundering out on all hands that dreadful voice Cursed is every one that continuâ—th not in all things written in the law to do them did darken the clearness of the grace of GOD and perplex poor sinners filling them with affrightments and hindâ—ing them from full discerning of the clemency and mercy of the LORD Thenâ—â—g in it aggravated their pains by its ceremonies the true scope of which it was at that time very difficult to comprehend aright And lastly It shut the gate of the House of GOD against the Gentiles of whose number the Colossians were it being as an enterclose that separated them from his people and consequently cloigned them from his grace and pâ—rdon which he giveth not to any but such as are in his Covenant If therefore it were not absolutely contrary to us yet it cannot however be denied but that it was so in some sort In fine the Apostle saith that this obligation which was against us hath been effaced and entirely abolished and fastned to the Cross which also agreeth very pâ—â—per'y to the Law of Moses of which
be put in prison of all the force it had to endamage him He effaceth it cancels it and makes it null He renders useless all the preparatives of Justice against his friend He puts the Adversary and all his Advocates to silence He stops the mouth of the Judg that was even open to decree against him He stays the Serjâ—ants and secures his liberty from their outrages This is just the thing our LORD and Saviour hath done for us But what say I he hath done thus for us He hath done for us infinitely more than all that this comes to Death and the Curse were due to us as the wages of our sins The sentence of it was written in â—he obligation of the Law which we our selves had signed and wherein we had submitted to this penalty The Judg was ready and Execution could not be avoided The LORD JESUS moved with compassion and sent by the goodness of the Father puts himself in our room as Surety and Mediator for us He pays what we did owe. He suffers on the Cross the punishment we deserv'd His Cross therefore hath struck out that redoubtable obligation which was against us He hath abolish'd and made it of no effect He hath broken all the forces it was going to raise against us He hath pacified our Judg coufounded our Accusers staid the Officers and Ministers of Justice and sav'd our persons from the fetters and torments which were prepared for us But hence again appears how vain the error of those is who pretend that GOD doth but half-pardon our sins that having remitted unto us the fault he doth exact of us part of the punishment and make us suffer it either in this life here or after death in a certain partition of Hell which they call Purgatory How could they more rudely clash with the Apostle's Doctrine He saith that GOD hath effaced cancelled and abolished the obligation which was against us These men affirm that he still makes us pay some part of our debt Sure then our obligation is not yet torn It 's a thing unheard-of in the course of Justice to bring an Action against that Debtor whose Obligation you have effaced If it be torn if it be made void and of no effect you have no longer any right to draw him before the Judg much less to get him condemned to pay If GOD who doth nothing but according to Justice should make us pay any part of the penalties of our sins which he hath forgiven us the Obligation by virtue whereof he condemneth us is still in its full force But the Apostle protesteth that it hath been effaced and remains blotted and nailed to the Cross of CHRIST for ever The Obligation which was against us imported all the punishments both temporal and eternal that we were obnoxious unto It is voided and nulled We therefore do no longer owe any of them Fear not Christian you have to do with a faithful Creditor Having remitted to you your debt yea cancell'd the evidence of it and torn the Obligation he hath no intent at all after all this to demand any part of it of you I confess that the payment JESUS CHRIST hath made is of no use to such as remain in unbelief and though he hath in point of right nulled the Obligation which was against us yet their ingratitude and infidelity is a cause that they have no benefit from this kindness of his Even as the unthankfulness and obdurateness of that servant of whom we are told in that Parable in the Gospel did deprive him of the favour his Master had shewed him in forgiving the ten Talents he owed For GOD hath affixed this reasonable condition to the Covenant of Grace which he hath made with Mankind that the payment of our Debts made by our Surety should not be allowed to any but those that believe so as they that obstinately abide in incredulity have no share in that impunity or in those other benefits which this great Mediator hath obtained for us But as to the man that believeth and by a true faith applieth applieth to himself the death and blood and merit of the LORD JESUS there is no more any condemnation for him Rom. 8.1 as the Apostle elsewhere saith nor by consequence any punishment the obligation by virtue whereof alone he could be condemned at the Tribunal of GOD having been effaced abolished and fastned to the Cross of his Saviour Thus you see Beloved Brethren what that grace of GOD is which the Apostle hath here made known and by what means we may get part in it Sinners you that groan under the heavy load of your crimes that feel your misery and perceive the cords of that damnation in which the Law doth entangle you come unto the Cross of CHRIST and you shall find rest to your souls Your consciences accuse you and compel you to subscribe your own condemnation acknowledging the justness thereof But how just soever it be the Cross of JESUS freeth you from it forasmuch as it hath fully fatish'd for you Beware of the error both of the ancient and the modern Pharisees who pretend ability to pay what they owe and even more than they owe and to justifie themselves by their works that is by the Law The Law is the instrument of our condemnation and the ministration of our death and a man that would be justified by the Law commits no less an extravagance than he that to prove he owes nothing should produce in Judgment the Bills and Bonds he hath given his Creditors Confess you your debts Divest your selves of all presuming upon your own righteousness Declare that of your selves you are bound over to eternal malediction that you have deserv'd it and do present your selves naked before GOD who justifies the ungodly He will clothe you with the righteousness of his Son And you Faithful Brethren who are already entred into this blessed Covenant Live ye in peace and quietly wait for the fruit of your faith according to the promises of GOD. Let not the thundrings and lightnings of the Law make you afraid Let not that death with which it so severely menaceth the sons of men terrifie you at all Let not World or Devils the Executioners of its Justice astonish you JESUS CHRIST hath brought to nought all their strength by effacing the obligation that was against us Satan thou cruel enemy of our repose object not to us our sins We confess they are greater and yet more grievous than thou canst express Lay not before us that clause of our old Covenant which puts all that have sinned under the curse We confess we have merited this curse But know Satan if we have deserv'd death JESUS CHRIST hath suffer'd it for us and if we have committed sins worthy of thine Hell the Blood of the Son of GOD hath blotted them out His Cross hath made void that old piece upon which thou makest such a clamour that rough obligation with which thou incessantly
people do not reject the word either of the Gospel or the Law which is neither the one nor the other addressed to them yet can they not be excused of contemning that other voice of GOD which makes it self be heard from Heaven throughout all the earth and soundeth secretly in every man's heart and privily calleth them to repentance for their sins to piety to honesty to justice and rectitude They profanely reject this sacred declaration of the Deity without which GOD never left a man among the nations no not the most forlorn or most desperately plunged in idolatry and viciousnesse as the Apostle teacheth us in the Acts. They despise those admirable directions He gives them in the governing of the world to seek Him feel Him and find Him Acts 14.17 17.26 27. They make light of the evidences He offers them in His administration of the universe of His eternal power and Godhead and finally do abuse the riches of His mercy of His patience Rom. 1.20 2.4 and of His long-suffering by which His goodness inviteth and solliciteth all men to repentance Whence appears the wonderfulnesse not only of the justice but even of the gentleness and benignity of GOD who having right to punish men upon the first sin they are sound guilty of yet doth it not but calleth and inviteth them to repentance and waiteth for them and causeth not His wrath to come upon them untill to the crime of their sin they have added that of rebellion against that second way of salvation which He in His loving kindness offers them to wit the way of repentance For that which the Apostle saith here of fornicators and the avaricious in particular is true of all vices in general the wrath of Heaven cometh not upon them that are guilty but when by their unbelieving and obduration they have made themselves children of rebellion and there is not a sinner in the world how great and enormous soever his crimes may be but this good and all-merciful Majesty receives most readily to mercy providâ— only he repent according to the Prophet's saying that God willeth not the death of a sinner Ezek. 33. but that he be converted and live so as henceforth it is not simply sin that damneth men but impenitency and unbelief And the goodnesse of GOD doth so much the more gloriously appear in this procedure of His towards them for that to have the liberty of treating thus with them He bought it if I may so speak at the price of the blood of His only Son whom He such is His goodnesse to us deliver'd up to the death of the Cross to salve the interests of His justice which opposed this way of mercy that He inclined to open unto men after their falling into sin But this very thing shews us on the other hand how great the corruption of men is and how untractable the furiousnesse of the passion they have for vice in that not content to be debauched from the service of their Soveraign which is of it self an horrible attentat and worthy of a thousand penalties they are so desperately in love with sin that to continue in it they despise and even reject with an enraged insolency all this holy and sacred mysterie of the kindnesse of GOD and are so inchanted and bestialized by the poisons of sin that they preferr its short its vain and wretched pleasures before Divine grace and salvation and do less dread the wrath of their Soveraign and the society of Devils and the torments of Hell than the loss of that unworthy and shameful delight which the practise of sin and the fulfilling of its lusts doth give them for a few daies But we may further observe here the Apostle's holy art who aiming to divert the Colossians from avarice and the pollution of carnal pleasures doth not tell them that GOD will punish them heavily if they do not avoid them this language would have in some sort offended them as implying that they had some inclination or disposition to such a faultinesse On the contrary presupposing that this would not betide them to give them horror at these crimes he shews them the just punishments of them in the person of the unbelieving and rebellious like a tender and a prudent father who to imprint an hatred of vice and debauch in the heart of his child chastiseth the slaves in his presence that the example of those vile and wretched persons may teach him what punishments he will deserve if he come to fall into any such disorder he who is the son of his house the heir of his freedom and estate For we must not fancy that because we have the honour to be of the alliance of GOD we may therefore commit with impunity those sins which the LORD punisheth so severely in those that are without Far from us be so fottish and so pernicious a conceit It 's vice that GOD hateth and not persons and whoever hardens himself therein live he in any profession Pagan or Christian reformed or otherwise he is a child of rebellion and the advantage and excellency of the profession he makes is so far from exempting him from that it will aggravate his punishment it being most just as our Saviour teacheth us Luke 12.47 that he who knew the will of his Master and doth it not should receive more stripes than he that offends ignorantly And when a true believer salleth through infirmity into some one of these disorders as alas happens but too often GOD plainly shews how much it doth displease Him never failing to rebuke and chasten it except a prompt repentance do prevent such chastening of His. 1 Pet. 4.17 1 Cor. 11.32 Judgment saith St. Peter beginneth at the house of GOD. And He judgeth us saith St. Paul and teacheth us that we may not be condemned with the world as we shall assuredly be if we persevere in sin without repentance and amendment Hence the Apostle fearing lest some such imagination should abuse the Ephesians he gives them the same intimation with express advice that they suffer not themselves to be beguiled with a false hope of impunity Eph. 5.6 Let none saith he deceive you with vain words For for these things the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion But further his threatning here particularly fornication uncleannesse inordinate appetite evil concupiscence and covetousnesse in saying that it is for these things the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of rebellion is not to signifie that other excesses of such rebellions ones as their cruelties their murthers their ambitions and the like exorbitances should remain unpunished on the contrary Rom. 1.18 Rom. 2.9 he else-where expresly declareth that the wrath of GOD is revealed peremptorily upon all ungodliness and unrighteousness and again that there shall be tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doth evil But he hath denounced this wrath of GOD upon the luxurious and
may effectually further our edification and consolation The benefit of our redemption being very great and most admirable in all respects as we even now intimated it 's with great reason that the Apostle beginneth his discourse of it by giving of thanks unto GOD. And in his Epistles ordinarily he scarce ever speaks of it but praising withall or admiring the goodness of the LORD He directeth his thanksgiving to the Father as the first and supream author of this excellent work Think not that he denieth the Son or the Spirit their part in it or that he would deprive them of the glory due to them for it For since these three persons are but one only and the same GOD it is evident that the works of the Deity appertain to them all three But as they subsist in a certain order the Father of Himself the Son of the Father who generated Him the Holy Spirit of the Father and the Son of whom He proceedeth from all eternity so likewise do they act in the same disposition And forasmuch as the Father is the first in this order of their subsistence and operation thence it comes that He addresseth His benedictions particularly to Him as the prime and the soveraign source of the Deity from whence originally hath streamed down upon us all the good and grace that we have received in our redemption But let us see how the Apostle describeth this work of our salvation for which he gives the LORD thanks He hath made us capable saith he to partake of the inheritance of Saints in light After that Sin had made a separation between GOD and us it was naturally impossible for us to have part in any of His blessings The LORD therefore designing to save us took care first of all to remove this obstacle of our communication with Him This He did satisfying His justice by the expiation of sin through the death of His Son JESUS CHRIST and by that means the liberty of that commerce between His goodness and our poor nature which our sin had interrupted was opened again so as henceforth nothing hindreth save on mans own part but he may make his approaches to GOD and partake of his Grace through faith and repentance Yet this is not the thing which the Apostle intendeth in this place when he saith that the Father hath made us capable of having part in His inheritance For this grace by which He hath opened the Throne of His beneficence through the expiation of sin doth generally respect all men nor is there any but access thither is free for him if he present himself with faith and repentance whereas the Grace whereof the Apostle speaketh here is appropriate to him and the Colossians and such as resemble them that is in a word it 's peculiar to true believers and not common to all men It must be observed therefore in the second place that besides this first impediment which did shut up the gate of the House of GOD against us to wit the inexorable severity of His avenging Justice there is yet another no less difficult to be surmounted than the former though it be of another kind and a different nature It is the naughtiness the hardness and the blindness of our corrupt nature For as the justice of GOD would not permit that a creature foul with sin should approach Him except its sin were expiated so His wisdom could not suffer it should finger any of His divine favours except it repented of having offended Him and believed His promises But in the estate we lye in since our fall our soul is so depraved by sin that it is not capable of its self either to consider GOD or to put affiance in His goodness and so this great Miracle of the love of GOD towards us I mean the expiation of sin by the death of His Son would remain without any saving effect in respect of us if leaving us in the condition we were born He did but simply present the declarations of His grace in external means to us For this cause therefore this kind and compassionate LORD not content to have opened the gate of His bounty by the Cross of His CHRIST doth also fetch us up from the grave of our impiety and gives us the will and the strength to come to Himself It is properly this second benefit peculiar to those that believe which the Apostle meaneth here when he saith that GOD hath made us capable to partake of His inheritance The first gift of the Father did capacitate His hand to communicate His treasures to us and the second doth capacitate us to handle them Without the death of His dear Son He might not give us life and without Hâ—s effectual calling we could not receive it of Him Faithful Sirs mark well this lesson of the Apostle Who giveth thanks to GOD for that He hath made us capable of partaking of His inheritance He first brings down thereby the pride of those that give this glory to free will boasting that they have made themselves capable of salvation either by some kind of pre-dispositions which oblige GOD at least by the way of decency to give them His grace or by the due using and menaging of afflictions the pride I say of all those in general who pretend that it is in a mans own power to prepare himself for the heavenly inheritance No saith the Apostle This wholy appertaineth unto GOD. It is He that hath made us capable 2 Cor. 3.5 Of our selves we cannot so much as think a good thought so he affirms elsewhere I confess that this impotency of man is voluntary and consequently criminal it proceeds from the extream badness of his heart and from no defect of any of those things which are necessary from without for this effect For what else besides his own rebelliousness doth hinder him from believing in GOD and embracing with repentance the exhibitions of His grace which are presented to him either in the course of nature or in the Law or by the Gospel Yet so it is that how voluntary soever this His naughtiness be it is invincible and altogether refractory It is no longer a weakness It 's a formed impotency which nature is not able to correct And the Scripture speaks of it every where in this sense 1 Cor. 2.14 Rom. 8.5 The carnal man saith the Apostle cannot understand the things of the Spirit of GOD because they are spiritually discerned And elsewhere The affection of the flesh is enmity against GOD. For it rendreth not its self subject to the Law of GOD Joh. 12.39 Jer. 6.10 13.23 nor indeed can And St. John speaking of the Jews They cannot believe saith he And Jeremiah of their Ancestours Their ear saith he is uncircumcised and they cannot hear Will the Ethiopian change his skin and the Leopard his spots so can you do any good who have learned to do only evil such is the miserable state of all men
GOD is which we have by JESUS CHRIST It is Deliverance saith the Apostle The word he useth in the Original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 particularly signifieth a deliverance effected by some ransom given for bringing the delivered out of the bast estate he was in and it is properly that which we call Redemption For a man may be delivered divers wayes either by being simply put out of the affliction he was in as when a master enfranchiseth his slave setting him at liberty of His good will or when a Creditor lets his Debtor out of prison forgiving him the debt or by exchange as when one prisoner of War goes for another or by forcible recovery as when Abraham delivered Lot by defeating his enemies and David his people that had been taken by the Amalekites The deliverance we have by JESUS CHRIST is not of this sort He hath procured it by the ransome He gave for us and it 's this that the word Redemption here used by the Apostle doth signifie But the same term informeth us also that the benefit which we have received of Him is not simply the gift of life It is a deliverance which brings us out of some misery GOD gave life and immortality to the Angels but He gave them no deliverance since they never were in sin or misery and before Adam's fall He promised Him life it 's true but not salvation and redemption because man was then in his integrity without sin and misery likewise The benefit we receive of Him by JESUS CHRIST is not simply life and immortality it is a deliverance a salvation a redemption that not only conferreth some good on us but taketh us out from sin and freeth us from misery The Apostle explains it us more particularly when he adds That this redemption which we have in JESVS CHRIST is the remission of sins True it is the word Redemption is general comprising under it deliverance from any evil whatsoever certain it is also that the number of our evils is great and that JESUS CHRIST hath delivered us not from one or two evils only but from all He hath delivered us from the ignorance into which we were naturally plunged He hath delivered us from the bondage of the Flesh the lusts whereof did exercise an horrible tyranny in our members He hath delivered us from that death which we were made subject unto and from the curse of the Eternal Father which we had deserved For which cause the Apostle elsewhere saith that JESUS CHRIST is made unto us not simply righteousness but also wisdom sanctification and redemption and in a multitude of places that He hath brought us out of darkness and delivered us from the tyrannous power of sin and death But though all this be very sure yet in this place he restraineth the Redemption we have in JESUS CHRIST to the remission of sins and that in my opinion for two reasons First because remission of sin is the first and the principal of His benefits the basis and foundation of all the rest which necessarily leads them on and without which it is not possible to reach any of them For sin as you know is expresly that which makes separation between GOD and us The cause why this most merciful and all-powerful Ruler of the world taketh from us the light of His knowledge and the communication of His goodness leaving us in the darkness of errour and in misery is neither hatred nor contempt nor disdain of His creatures It 's nothing but our Sin His justice and soveraign equity permitting Him not to crown with His blessings people that are criminal JESUS CHRIST therefore intervening and procuring for us the remission of our sins thereby bringeth us out of the ill case we were in and openeth the fountain of celestial good which was before shut up by Justice This obstacle being removed this sluice if I may so say opened Divine goodness recovering its natural course floweth forth upon us and poureth into us light peace holiness and life It is not then to exclude these other benefits of the Redemption which is by JESUS CHRIST that the Apostle defineth it hereby the remission of sins For it compriseth them all none having this remission but they have also upon it all the LORD 's other graces but to shew us the due order of all the parts of this deliverance of which remission of sin is the first and principal Secondly the Apostle doth this because the ransome which the word Redemption doth imply was not properly necessary save for obtaining the remission of sins Except for this there was no need that JESUS CHRIST should lay down His life for us For supposing that a pure and sinless creature should have lain in ignorance and misery and if you will even in death it self There would have been no necessity that the Son of God should have shed His blood or suffered death to bring it up thence It would have sufficed He had loved it His good will would have immediately moved His power to display it self in its behalf and fetch it out of its distress there being nothing to hinder this natural operation of His goodness and so the happiness of such a creature would have been simply a deliverance and not a redemption But forasmuch as we were sinners it was necessary for our recovery that JESUS CHRIST should make His soul an offering for sin and pay the ransome of our liberty Whence it follows that to speak properly and exactly there is nothing but the remission of sins that should be called redemption as the Apostle defineth it in this place the other deliverances which we obtain by our LORD being only fruits and consequents of the remission of sin This then is the grand atchievement of the Son of GOD the miracle of His goodness and love that He hath procured and obtained for us the remission of our sins This is our true redemption Without this redemption we should still be enemies of GOD. We should not have any part either in His grace or in His glory Be even what you can desire in other respects Have all the goods of the earth all perfections of body and mind Be Monark of the whole world Have if it were possible the lights of Angels and the riches of their knowledge If you have not the remission of your sins you are a bondman and a wretch a slave to Devils and vanity and death since true redemption is the remission of sins But as without it it is impossible to be otherwise than infinitly wretched so with it it is not possible to be otherwise than infinitely happy The repose of the conscience the illumination of the understanding the jewel of sanctification the Graces of the celestial spirit life and immortality do inseparably follow it Go in peace said the LORD JESUS to those whose sins He pardoned as if He had said thou hast nothing more to fear since thy sin is forgiven thee There is no
and death of our LORD because He by dying sealed the truth of what He preached in His life this is evidently to mock the world His miracles also confirmed His doctrine and yet neither Scripture nor any wise man ever said that we have remission of sins by His miracles as St. Paul saith here and elsewhere often that we have it by His blood and by His death Besides if this reason must take place since the Martyrs suffered to seal the same doctrine it may be also said that we have redemption and remission of sins by their blood which is not read at all On the contrary the Apostle vehemently denies that either himself or any other was crucified for us but CHRIST alone These reasons do destroy another shift these people use to wit that we have salvation by the death of JESUS CHRIST because in dying He gave us example of patience and perfect obedience For by this account the Martyrs whose sufferings had in them the like patterns should have saved us as well as CHRIST We add that patience and obedience do constitute part of our sanctification whereas the Apostle saith we have in JESUS CHRIST by His blood the remission of sins and not simply sanctification What they say for a third evasion is no better that CHRIST hath acquired by His death the right of pardoning sins For either their meaning is that the LORD hath rendred sin remittable by the satisfaction He hath made for it or they simply intend that CHRIST obtained by His death the power of pardoning sins which He had not before If they answer the first they grant us the very thing that we demand If the second they do thwart the Gospel which testifies that our LORD often remitted sins unto men while He lived and said expresly that He had authority on earth to forgive them In fine that which despair of so bad a cause suggesteth to them in the last place is of no more validity namely that the remission of our sins is attributed to the death of CHRIST because it preceded His resurrection the glory whereof lighteth up faith and repentance in us the true causes of that remission But they cannot produce any one example of so strange a manner of speaking and to say that the blood of CHRIST washeth away our sins because the effusion thereof preceded His resurrection the cause of that faith by which we obtain the pardon of them this is as much or more absurd than if you should say that it 's by the darkness of the night we are enlightned by day because the light of the Sun which then shineth on us had the darkness of the night preceding it After this account the remission of our sins should be everywhere attributed to the resurrection of CHRIST JESUS to His ascension up to Heaven and to the miracles of His Apostles and not to His Death whereas quite contrary it is ever constantly referred to the death to the blood and to the Cross of the LORD as to its true cause and not ever to His resurrection For as to that which the Apostle somewhere saith viz. that CHRIST rose again for our justification his meaning is not that our sins obliged Him to rise as they had obliged Him to dye Rom. 4.25 according to what he had affirmed that He was delivered for our offences but that He might apply to men the fruit of His death in justifying them by the Vertue of His blood therefore was He raised from the grave and crowned with highest glory this being necessary for the production of those divine effects in the world Say we then that the LORD by pouring out His blood and His life on the Cross did truly satisfie the avenging Justice of the Father undergoing for us and in our room that death which we deserved and without this laid down there can be no rational asserting what the Apostle saith here and in divers other places to wit that we have remission of sins in JESUS CHRIST by His blood But from the same Apostolical assertion it is also very evident that none other but our LORD alone is capable of satisfying for us For since the remission of sins is our Redemption who seeth not but that if any one procure it for us he must be our Redeemer a title which by the unanimous consent of all Christians appertaineth singly to JESUS CHRIST Moreover it 's by the blood of our LORD that this remission hath been purchased so as neither Paul nor Cephas nor any other having been Crucified for us it likewise followeth that no one of them hath either satisfied GOD for us or merited the remission of sins â—eo Mag. Serm. 12. de Passion Though their death be precious in the sight of GOD said an Ancient long since yet there was none of them how innocent soever he might be whose suffering could be the propitiation of the world The just have received crowns not given them and from their constancy and stedfastness in the faith have grown up examples of patience not gifts of righteousness This glory is due to nothing but the blood of CHRIST And as He is the only victime that was offered up for our sins so is it sufficient to expiate them all Never man found favour but through this sacrifice Never did the sword of GOD spare any but for the sake of this blood St. Paul teacheth it us in this Text and it 's the last particular we have to observe upon it For when he saith We have redemption in JESVS CHRIST by His blood he intends not to speak singly of himself and the Colossians but of all the faithful that were on earth and even of those that had lived from the beginning of the world unto that time There neither was nor ever had been salvation in any other but in Him And as sin and death descended from Adam upon all men so the righteousness and life of all the faithful cometh from JESUS CHRIST Rev. 13.8 Heb. 9.15 He is the Lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world and His death intervened for a ransome of the transgressions that were under the Old Testament as well as of those that are committed under the New His blood is the remission of the sins both of the one and the other people It 's being to be shed in due time gave it the same efficacy for the generations that preceded His Cross as it had afterwards by its actual effusion in those that succeeded it GOD the Father appeased by this sacrifice ever present in His sight as well before as after its oblation did communicate the fruit and merit of it that is to say grace and remission to all those that believed in Him under the one and the other Testament Behold Beloved Brethren that which we had to say to you concerning the Redemption we have in JESUS CHRIST The Text of the Apostle teacheth it us and the table of the LORD representeth it to
doth whatsoever He will The Son hath all power in Heaven and in Earth and there is nothing but is facile to Him The Father is super-eminently good hating evil and loving rectitude and justice The Son is the Saint of Saints entirely separate from sinners goodness and justice it self The Father is merciful and inclined to pity The Son is the bottom of His compassions The Father maketh His Sun to shine on and His Rain to bedew even the men that blaspheme Him The Son dyed for His enemies and prayed for those that crucified Him In short the Father hath not any other essential quality but the Son hath it likewise and in the same measure with the Father I come to His Works Certainly the Son Himself informeth us how perfectly He represents the Father in this respect Joh. 5.19 saying in general that what thing soever the Father doth the same doth the Son likewise The Father created the Universe The Son founded the Earth Heb. 1.10 Joh. 1.3 and the Heavens are the work of His hands All things were made by Him and without Him nothing was made of all that was made The Father conserveth the world by His providence the Son sustaineth all things by His mighty word The Father hath set up the Princes and Magistrates who govern mankind Prov. 8.15 and there is no power but of Him It 's by the Son that Kings Reign and Princes decree justice The Father saved and redeemed the Church the Son is our righteousness our wisdom and our redemption The Father loved us and delivered up His Son to death for us the Son gave Himself a ransome for our sins If the Father raised up the Son the Son also raised again His own Temple when the fury of the Jews had beaten it down If the Father quicken the dead the Son quickneth them likewise and the last judgment the punishing of the wicked in Hell the glory of the Faithful in Heaven and all that refers to it is the work both of the one and the other The Father hath elected us so likewise hath the Son Joh. 13.18 I know saith He whom I have chosen It is the same in all the other actions and operations of the divine nature If you read the Scriptures exactly you shall not see any of them attributed to the Father but is likewise attributed to the Son And as for that right and soveraign authority which accreweth unto GOD over all things from these great and high qualities and operations this glory shineth in the person of the Son as it doth in the person of the Father If the Father be Judge of the earth King of ages and Monarch of the world the Son is in like manner the LORD of glory the head of the Armies of Heaven the Prince of men and Angels the Judge of all flesh If the Name of the Father be great and dreadful that of the Son is above every name which is named in this world or in the world to come If all creatures both superiour intermedial and inferiour do owe a soveraign homage to the Father and cast down themselves before Him adoring His Majesty with the profoundest respect they are capable of so it is clear that before JESUS every knee doth bow both of things in Heaven and things on earth and things under the Earth the Father Himself proclaiming when He bringeth Him into the world Let all the Angels of GOD worship Him So you see Dear Brethren that the LORD JESUS is truly the image of His Father since He hath and discovereth perfectly in Himself the Nature the Properties and the Works of the Father An admirable a singular and a truly Divine image which possesseth the whole form of its original without any variation and faithfully and naturally representeth all the features of it in their true and just greatness measure and nature I confess there are among men sons that resemble in some sort their Fathers but there are none in whom such resemblance is comparable with that of the Son of GOD to His Eternal Father If our Sons represent our nature and manners it is always with some difference which a piercing and a clear-sighted eye may easily observe and after all there are none that in their life do express the lives of their fathers totally entire with every one of their actions and operations Whereas the Son of GOD is a most complete image both of the nature and the life of His Father if we may speak in this manner of these mysteries all the works of the one whether small or great being also the works of the other This sacred Verity taught here by the Apostle overthroweth two heresies which though contrary and opposite to one another did sometime equally trouble the Church of GOD. I mean that of the Sabellians and that of the Arians The former confounded the Son with the Father the latter rent them on sunder Those took from the Son His person these His nature For the Sabellians did dogmatize that the Father and the Son were but one and the self-same person who according to the divers wayes and ends of his manifestations did assume sometimes the name of Father sometimes the name of Son So as in their account it is the Father who suffered on the Cross and it 's the Son who sent Him that suffered St. Paul breaketh their errour by saying that JESVS CHRIST is the image of the Father For no one is the image of himself and how great and exact soever the image's resemblance of its original be it 's of necessity that it be another subsistence than its original A child hath the same nature with the Father whose image it is said to be but nevertheless the person of the Father is one and that of the child another Since then the Apostle declareth here and elsewhere that JESVS CHRIST is the image of GOD that is to say of the Father we must either desert His doctrine or acknowledge that JESUS CHRIST is another person than the Father But if you distinguish their persons it doth not follow that you must divide their nature as did the Arians who made it their position that the nature of the Father is another than that of the Son the one increated and infinite the other created and finite These are two shelves which we must equally avoid steering our course straight in the midst shunning on one side the confusion of Sabellius and on the other the division of Arius JESVS CHRIST saith the Apostle is the image of GOD His Father He could not be the image of Him if He were one same person with Him He could not be His Perfect image if He had a nature differing from the nature of the Father How should He represent His eternity if He had been created in time How His immensity if He had a limited essence How His Majesty and glory if He were but a creature Let us then hold fast this truth full and entire
we now behold upon it It s in this sence that the Apostle St. John gives the name of the Fulness of CHRIST to that total abundance of perfections and divine graces which dwelt in Him His wisdom His justice His sanctification and His redemption when he saith that of His fulness we all have received Joh. 1.16 And it is after the same manner that S. Paul hereafter by the fulness of the Godhead meaneth all the qualities or properties of the Divine Nature its Understanding its Wisdom its Omnipotency it 's Goodness and Infinite Justice saying That in JESVS CHRIST dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily Col. 2.9 It is therefore in this sense also as seems to me that we must take the word Fulness in this Text referring it to the things whereof the Apostle had even now spoken when he affirmed That JESVS CHRIST is the Image of the invisible GOD the First-born of every creature by whom all things were created and do subsist the Head of the Church the Beginning and the First-born from the dead holding the first place in all things For these qualities as you see are the perfections and excellencies partly of the Divine Nature and partly of the Humane the former namely His being the Image of GOD and the Master and Author of the Creatures pertaining to the Divine the latter to wit His being the Head of the Church and the First-born from the dead to the Humane so as when the Apostle after these things addeth now For it was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell it is as much as if He had said For it was the Fathers will that there should appear in His CHRIST a rich and a compleat abundance of all Divine and Humane perfections all the beauty dignity and excellency that replenisheth heaven and earth that adorneth the nature of GOD and of men And so the question which Interpreters debate whether this Fulness should be referred to the Divinity or to the Humanity of our LORD is cleared for this Exposition comprizeth them both the eternal Wisdom and Power of the one with all its attributes the Sanctity and Charity of the other with all the graces which have been given it without measure This is the All-fulness that dwelleth in JESUS CHRIST And the word Dwelleth hath here a great deal of Emphasis For in the stile of Scripture it signifies an abode not transient and for a time only but such as is firm constant and durable So that the Apostle saying That all fulness dwelleth in CHRIST doth thereby shew us that this rich abundance of all Divine and Humane perfections shall eternally be in Him not as the Divine Glory and Majestie erewhile was in the Tabernacle of Moses and in the Temple of Solomon where it lodg'd but for a space not as the irradiations of the Deity in the souls of the Prophets which they fill'd but for some hours finally not as the graces and perfections that do for some years only enrich the bodies and spirits of mortal men old age and a thousand other accidents and in the end death it self quickly despoiling them of the same which makes the sacred Writers say that the comliness of flesh and the fashion of this world passeth away and that it is like to flowers and herbs in whom beauty tarrieth but a few days time without delay plucking it from them and defacing all the lineaments of it Our CHRIST is an eternal Temple which the Glory of GOD filleth both continually and for ever It doth not meerly lodge there it dwelleth there as in its true and incorruptible Sanctuary Never shall the same be void of it This Fulness shall abide eternally in Him But the Apostle saith That it was the good pleasure of the Father that this fulness should dwell in Him By the good pleasure of the Father he meaneth according to the ordinary stile of Scripture the determination and order of the Eternal wisdom of GOD. For CHRIST did not violently snatch up this glory nor did He assume it to Him of Himself He receiv'd it by the will of the Father who gave Him and sent Him into the world pouring into Him all the treasures of His graces that we might draw from His fulness all the good we need for our happiness But further it must be remembred that the Apostle considereth the LORD JESUS here as CHRIST and Mediator and not simply as the Son of GOD he considereth Him in regard of His Office and not in respect to His first and original nature for if you look upon Him this second way it is clear that being GOD Eternal with the Father He receiv'd of Him His Divine Essence with all its fulness not by any Decree of His will or of His good pleasure but by a natural communication that is to say by an Eternal Ineffable and Incomprehensible generation The Creation of the world is a work of the good pleasure of GOD the Generation of the Son is a natural act of the Person of the Father The first was done in time the other is before all time The world which is the effect of Creation had a beginning of being the Son who is the fruit of the foresaid Generation is Eternal without beginning as well as without end of days But this Son who is GOD by nature is CHRIST by the will of the Father for the name CHRIST signifies an Office and not strictly an Essence or a Nature Originally this Office was not fastned to the Person of the Son He might have been the Son without being our Mediator and had subsisted so indeed if the sin of man had not intervened or if the Justice of GOD had left us in the misery whereinto sin had precipitated us But this good and gracious LORD having had compassion on us and resolved thereupon to bring us up from those deeps of death in which we lay did ordain a Mediator who might effect this great work and invested Him with all the qualities and perfections that were necessary for this end It 's therefore precisely under this respect that the Apostle considers JESUS CHRIST here when he saith It was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell He thereby meaneth it was the Fathers will that in this Sacred Person of the Mediator who was established and destinated for our salvation all perfection richness grace and excellency should meet together Divinity and Humanity filled with the infinite aboundance of all the qualities and properties that pertain to them concur Such being His good pleasure He chose His Son GOD co-eternal and co-essential with Himself who uniting all the riches of His Deity with the Humane nature He assumed constituteth one only person in the bosom of which dwelleth all this fulness that is necessary for the charge of Mediator Whence it appears how vain the cavil of Hereticks is who conclude from this passage that the Deity of the
dying of CHRIST in His body and His brandings in His flesh Whence appears to note it by the way how absurd the belief of Purgatory is which makes the faithful to suffer not in the flesh but in the Spirit and extendeth their afflictions and pains beyon the days of their flesh in which nevertheless the Apostle teacheth us that their sufferings are compleated Thus you see what the sense of his words is and how much reason he had to rejoyce in his sufferings First because they were the afflictions of JESUS CHRIST the Prince of life and the author of our salvation Secondly Because they were dispensed by the order and the will of GOD. Thirdly because they made up the last part of the Apostles task being the going on and the remainder of the conflicts which he had to sustain And lastly because they contained an illustrious evidence of his gratitude towards the LORD and rendered him conform to His holy image in that as JESUS had suffered for his salvation he also suffered in his order for the glory of his gracious Master But he addeth yet another reason that sweetned likewise the bitterness of his sufferings to him and made him to find joy amid the horror of them It is that he suffered them for the body of the LORD which is His Church He had already said that he suffered for the Colossians as we have explained it Now he extendeth the fruit of his afflictions further saying that they are of use to the whole Church And to shew us how much weight this consideration should have to make his sufferings pleasant to him he gives the Church the highest and the most glorious appellation that can be attributed to any creatures calling it the body of CHRIST For what more illustrious and more precious subject can we suffer for than the body of the Son of GOD the King of ages the Father of eternity We have already treated of it at another time upon the eighteenth verse of this Chapter and shewed how and in what sense the Church is the body of CHRIST neither will we repeat ought of it for the present But his affirming that he fills up these afflictions for the Church is true and appeareth so to be in two respects First inasmuch as the Church was the occasion and indeed the cause of his sufferings For it was the service he did it in preaching the Gospel in instructing and comforting it in founding it and setling it in the faith that had provoked the Jews against him and involved him in the afflictions which did beset him As if a Princes servant zealous for his Masters glory and for the weal of his affairs should therethrough fall into some disaster he might say it was for him and his Estate that he shed his blood and lay a prisoner in his enemies hands Secondly S. Pauls afflictions were for the Church because he suffered them for the edification and consolation of the Church This was the scope of his patience and the design of His constancy It 's to the Church that all the fruit of these fair and illustrious examples of the Apostles vertue did redound He himself explains it to be thus elsewhere If we be afflicted saith he to the faithful it is for your consolation and salvation which is effected in enduring the same afflictions which we also suffer where you see that the fruit which the faithful reaped from these afflictions consisted in this that by the vertue of his example they were confirmed in the Gospel were rejoyced and comforted and fortified for the like combats And in the Epistle to the Philippians treating of the same bond Phil. 1.12 13 14. that he speaks of in this place I would ye should know saith he that the things which have betided me have fallen out rather to the greater furtherance of the Gospel So that my bonds in CHRIST have been noted in all the Palace and in all other places And many of the brethren in the LORD waxing confident by my bonds are much more bold to speak the word without fear Lo how his sufferings were for the Church in that they encouraged the Preachers and enkindled in the hearts of the faithful people the zeal of the house of GOD and in those without an inquisitiveness about the Gospel for which he was a prisoner This great man's preaching had never sparkled as it did it had never afforded the world and the Church so much edification and consolation if it had not been accompanied with sufferings sealed with his blood and confirmed by his wonderful patience amid the continual persecutions that were raised against him The conflicts of other servants of GOD have the same effect Their blood is the seed of the Church It 's from their sufferings that it springeth up It 's by them that it groweth and gathereth strength It 's the patience of these Divine Warriours that converted the world that conquered the nations unto JESUS CHRIST and planted His cross and His Gospel every where even in the most rebellious spirits Surely since the Church received so much profit from the Apostles afflictions it 's with good reason he affirms here that he filleth up the remainder of them for it And in this sence we must understand it when he saith elsewhere 2 Tim. 1.10 that he suffereth all things for the elects sake This may suffice for the proposal of the truth which is perspicuous and simple and obvious But the Error of our adversaries compelleth us to lengthen this discourse Not that they deny the exposition which we have produced For how could they do that without renouncing the doctrine of the Gospel and the confession of Christians in all ages But granting that the Apostles afflictions were for the Church in the sense we have expounded it they add that they were so further in another sense that is to say in that by undergoing them he satisfied for the sins of other believers and by this means did contribute to the greatning and enriching of the Churches treasury of satisfactions out of which the Bishop of Rome to whom the custody of it is committed makes largess from time to time as he judgeth meet for the expiating of the sins of penitents and hence hath risen the use of indulgences which is become so common in our dayes But first what kind of proof is this To shew that the Saints have satisfied Divine justice for the sins of other believers they alledge that S. Paul writeth I fill up the rest of the afflictions of CHRIST for His Church I answer his meaning is for edifying and comforting of the Church They acknowledge what I answer and only add that the Apostles sufferings do serve also for the expiating the sins of the Church and to fill the exchequer of its pretended satisfactions In conscience is this disputing Is it not a pronouncing of dictates after their own phantasie Is not this a presupposing of their opinion and no proving it It
The LORD is a true Divinity dwelling in a true Flesh and true Flesh dwelt in by a true Divinity There is a Divinity and an Humanity truly distinct the one of them from the other and each of them retaining its own beeing and proper qualifications but there is one only and the same Person who takes His Name sometimes from the one and sometimes from the other and sometimes jointly from them both For we call Him the Son of Mary and the Seed of David by reason of His Flesh The Everlasting GOD and the Word of the Father and the Lord of Glory by reason of His Divinity Immanuel that is to say GOD with us and GOD manifested in Flesh by reason of these two natures together I confess it is a mystery that surpasseth our comprehension and a wonder that hath no parallel But neither must we measure the verities of Religion by the Ell of our understandings especially when question is of GOD whose Nature Reason it self doth confess to be infinite and incomprehensible It sufficeth that the word of the LORD informeth us it is so And though our reason cannot discern the manner how yet it being once illuminated by Divine revelation it acknowledgeth a kind of necessity of it For presupposing what the Scripture doth discover and reason approve of the desert of sin and of the infinite punishment that is due to it as also of the inflexible constancy of Divine Justice which cannot let sin pass unpunished it evidently follows that man could not have been reconciled to GOD unless his Justice were satisfied nor his Justice have been satisfied without a Sacrifice of infinite worth and merit So as it being the office of CHRIST to reconcile men unto GOD it is clear that for the effecting of this great design he must offer to the Father a Sacrifice of infinite value and consequently be GOD since nothing can proceed from a finite subject but what is also finite and none is infinite but GOD alone It was necessary therefore that all the fulness of the Godhead should dwell bodily in our Mediator Not to speak of other emoluments which this admirable union of our Nature with the Divine in the Person of JESUS CHRIST doth afford us as the assurance it gives us of the infinite love of GOD and of our salvation the title it procureth us to the merits of our Saviour whom it hath made our Brother and consequently our selves capable of being his co-heirs the consolation it sheds into our hearts of his whom we serve having an infinite power and wisdom to defend us in our combats to strengthen us in our weaknesses to preserve us against all the assaults of Hell and the World and redeem us from death the last of our enemies it being evident that if we had but a meer man for a Saviour how holy and excellent soever he might be there would remain unto us still very great and just causes of diffidence and fear Therefore blessed for ever be the Father of our LORD blessed be his love and that great mercy which induced him to send us so excellent and admirable a Mediator as hath all the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in him bodily Let us receive him with faith and adore him with devotion and serve him with zeal Neither let his flesh be an offence to us It is very flesh I grant but the flesh of an Eternal GOD who under this Pavilion of his visible abasement of himself which the world otherwhile so insolently despised hath lodged all the glory of Heaven and all the fulness of the Divinity Nor let his Majesty and this fulness of the Godhead which dwelleth in him affright us He 's a great God I confess but a GOD manifested in flesh dwelling in our nature descending and humbled even to our degree and partaking of our flesh and our blood that he might bring us to himself Let us embrace with reverence that most sacred Religion which he hath brought us from Heaven And indeed iâ— the World hath followed and held fast and still in divers places doth with so much earnestness follow and hold Religions invented and erected by vain men who were full of ignorance and error what respect do we not owe to this same one that hath been given us by the hand and mouth of a person in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead Moses was but GOD's Servant and you see what respect the ancient people bore him and with what severity all disobediences and rebellions against his Ordinances were punish'd and how that poor Nation doth still at this day in vain adore the Sepulcher and Reliques of the Law which dyed and was abrogated long ago What penalties then must we expect if we despise the Doctrine of the Son who is eternally blessed with the Father Heb. 2.3 This great salvation as the Apostle elsewhere calls it which began to be declared first by the LORD All other Disciplines are perished or will in time perish Even that of Moses's did wax old and in the end was abolished But the Institutions of CHRIST shall remain for ever all-holy and all-perfect immutable and unalterable nor do they need any reformation or addition or amplification After the LORD we do not at all look for any other new Teacher to come into the world Moses promis'd another Prophet after his death to the people of GOD. JESUS CHRIST the Prophet so promised may have no Successor He doth not promise us any but only threatens us with divers seducers that would usurp His Name and counterfeit his Voice and put on sheeps cloathing to debauch his Disciples Whereupon we ought to take all those for suspicious that pretend to add any thing whatever to his sacred doctrine Besides our LORD and Saviour's own quality doth oblige us to content our selves with him and give no ear to any other For in him saith the Apostle dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily Seeing he hath fulness the man can want nothing that possesseth him according to what S. John saith He that hath the Son hath life that is eternal salvation which is all that we desire This short sentence of the Apostle's is enough to secure us against the artifices of all seducers if they set before us the delicacies and subtilities of Philosophy colouring their fond imaginations with a vain semblance of wisdom let us arm our selves with this consideration That we have in CHRIST JESUS all the true wisdom that is since in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead If any man offer us ancient traditions let us remember that the Authors of them were but men who how great and holy soever they may be are all liable to error whereas the Gospel which we do embrace is his doctrine in whom all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth bodily and by consequence pure and divine verity As for those Ancients and those Bishops and Pontiffs whose names and authority you our Adversaries do urge
that was against us which lay in ordinances and was contrary to us and which he hath entirely abolished having fastned it upon the cross DEar Brethren That remission of sins which GOD giveth to all those who believe in his Gospel is in truth of it self a great and inestimable grace For who seeth not but that it was an effect of a transcendent goodness in GOD to be willing to pardon such persons as had mortally offended him and consent to their happiness who had obliged him by their feloniousness and ingratitude to make them eternally miserable But the manner in which he hath pardoned us and the price that our grace hath cost him doth infinitely heighten the wonder of this benefit of his For he hath not forgiven us our sins by a single act of his will as a Creditor remitteth a Debt to his Debtor because such a man having absolute power to dispose of his Estate in favour of whom he pleaseth it is sufficient for his doing of such a kindness that he will do it With GOD it was not so in the present affair His Justice and the majesty of his Laws were concern'd in the favour he would shew us and formed an opposition against it with-holding and staying the motion of his Clemency towards us so as his own sanctity permitting him not to despise the voice of Reason and the rights of Justice for any one's sake whosoever the will he had to pardon us was not sufficient alone to bring it to effect And here it was that his love to us did shew it self admirable and truly divine For seeing that sin could not be forgiven us without satisfying that Justice which we had violated and on the other hand that this inexorable Justice could not be satisfied but by the Cross of his only Son this good and merciful LORD did so affect our bliss that to take away the legal impediments which Justice laid in against it he resolved to deliver up his Son to that cruel and shameful death as our Saviour himself hath declared in the Gospel John 3.16 saying that God so loved the world as he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life Here then properly is the highest pitch of this wonder which doth justly ravish men and Angels that the pardon of our sins which GOD hath given us was bought at the price of the death of his only beloved Son And in truth our consciences could not have been assured of his grace without the same Nature having planted in our hearts so quick a sense of the right that GOD hath against sins as we could not put an entire confidence in his mercy until we might know that his Justice was contented and dis-interessed Therefore the holy Apostle having represented to the faithful at Coloss in the precedent Verse the great favour that GOD had shewed them in the free forgiving of their offences doth now adjoin the foundation of this remission and the means by which it had been obtained He hath forgiven you having effaced saith he the obligation which was against us that lay in ordinances and was contrary to us and which he hath entirely abolished having fastned it to the cross By this consideration he giveth them to see the greatness of this benefit of GOD and doth assure their consciences against all the doubts that the rigour of the Law might raise in them and particularly against the contendings of those false Teachers who would make them believe that the grace of JESUS CHRIST was not sufficient for their salvation except they did moreover submit to observe the ceremonies of Moses This shall be by the will of GOD the subject of this Exercise and for the giving you a full understanding of this Text we will consider two things in it First What this obligation is whereof he speaks that lay in Ordinances and was contrary to us And Secondly How GOD did efface it abolish it and fasten it to the Cross of His Son It 's a similitude very ordinary in Scripture to liken Sin unto a Debt whence comes that phrase which is so common in the language of GOD and of the Church of the remitting or acquitting of sin for the pardoning of it Our Saviour us'd it in the prayer he gave us where the petition for the pardon of our sins is conceiv'd in these words in the Gospel of S. Matthew Acquit us our debts Mat. 6.12 Luke 11.4 as we also acquit them to our debtors that is to say as S. Luke hath interpreted it Forgive us our sins as we forgive them that owe us or that have offended us This form of speech was so ordinary among the Chaldees and Syrians that they put the word Debtor for Sinner or a guilty person as appears by the ancient Chaldee-Paraphrase upon the Psalms which saith Psal 1.1 Blessed is the man that standeth not in the way of debtors instead of saying sinners as the Hebrew Text of the first Psalm doth import And our LORD used the same word in this sense when upon speech of certain Galileans whose blood Pilate had cruelly mingled with their sacrifices he saith Think you that they were more debtors than other Galileans that is more culpable Luke 13.4 as the French hath it Thus also must we take it in that tradition of the Scribes and Pharisees reported by S. Matthew He that hath sworn by the gift which is upon the altar he oweth or is a debtor that is he sinneth or is culpable The reason of this Metaphor is founded upon the resemblance of the things themselves debt and sin having some conformity For as the one obligeth the debtor unto payment the other obligeth the sinner unto punishment And as a debt doth give the Creditor a certain power over his Debtor in like manner doth sin give unto GOD or unto the Magistrate over the offendor For he hath a just power to punish the sinner as a Creditor hath to make his Debtor pay though otherways as we said not long since there be some difference between the powers of the one and the other publick Justice being concern'd in the punishing of an offender whereas in a debtor's making payment it is not so whence it comes that debts may remain unpaid if the private person to whom they are due be pleased to remit them whereas Justice doth not leave a sin unpunished though the offended party doth quit his interest to the offender And this difference is seen in human affairs where you know that for the exempting of a Criminal from punishment it is not enough he do content his Adversary except the Prince who is Guardian of the Law and the Conservator of publike Justice do give him an abolition of his crime But setting aside this difference there is in other respects such an analogy between a debt and sin as the name of the one is justly applied to signifie the other This similitude is the
cause that S. Paul here gives the name of an Obligation to the Law or Testament of Moses The word he makes use of in the Original doth signifie generally any acknowledgment written or at least signed with our hand by which we confess our selves to owe a man such or such a sum and oblige our selves to pay him it at such time and in such manner as we have agreed upon Such are those which be commonly called Bills and Schedules But because of all Contracts of this kind an Obligation that passeth before Notaries with certain solemn forms is the most juridical the French Bible hath made use of the name thereof in particular An obligation then in Civil matters is a Creditor's Title and an evidence of the power he hath upon his Debtor to convince him of his debt and compel him to make payment if he do refuse It 's an authentick testimony of his owing such a sum which condemns him to pay and makes his body and goods liable in this behalf unto his Creditor Whence it appears that this Obligation whereof the Apostle speaks in the Text is the instrument of our condemnation and an authentick declaration and demonstration of our sin which gives valid testimony that we are guilty and subjecteth us by this means to the avenging Justice of GOD giving him a clear and undisputable right to prosecute and punish us All agree that the word Obligation must be so taken in this passage of the Apostle But when question is of founding the bottom and of determining what properly and precisely the thing is to which this quality agreeth and whereunto S. Paul's meaning was to give it there is found some difference among Expositors some conceiving it one particular and others another I will not stay to report their several opinions it being no way necessary for your edification I will content my self with representing to you that sense which I account the truest and which hath likewise been follow'd by divers eminent servants of GOD. I say then that this Obligation whereof the Apostle speaketh is no other thing than the old Law given in time past to the Israelites by the Ministry of Moses and of them accepted at Mount Sinai This appears first from S. Paul's saying that this obligation lay in ordinances For every one knows that this doth properly belong to the Law of Moses which consisted in a great many moral ceremonial and political Ordinances The Jews who are very exact and scrupulous in such matters reckon them up to Six hundred R. Moses ben Majm and their learned'st Authors divide them into fourteen Classes or ranks The whole body of these Ordinances is precisely the Law of Moses so as it is evident 't is this Law the Apostle means since he saith that what he meaneth lay in ordinances He thus explains it himself in a passage that hath great alliance with the Text in hand where speaking of the re-uniting of the Gentiles with the Jews into one only people done by our LORD JESUS CHRIST he saith that he abolished the enmity in his flesh to wit saith he the law of commandments which lay in ordinances where it is evident that he signifies the Law of Moses both by those express words the law of commandments and also by the nature of the thing it self it being certain that this enmity of the Jews and Gentiles that is the thing which separated them before our Saviour's dispensation was nought else but the Mosaical Law which the one of them had and the other had not The same appears again clearly from that conclusion which the Apostle inferrs from this Doctrine in the sixteenth and the following Verses of this Chapter For from his position here namely That the obligation which is in ordinances hath been effaced he concludeth that none ought to condemn us in eating or in drinking or in distinguishing of a Festival or of a new Moon or of Sabbaths and again that it is impertinent for any to burthen us with ordinances such as are Eat not Col. 2.21 tast not touch not Now every one seeth that these ordinances do make up a part of the Law of Moses Certainly then it 's that Law he doth mean here because otherwise it would not follow from the abolishing of our obligation that we are no longer subject to such things But the truth of this interpretation will be fully perceived by an exposition of the Apostle's own words themselves there being no other subject but the Mosaical Law to which all the circumstances and qualities he here attributes to it do properly agree First He termeth it an obligation against us Secondly He saith that it lay in ordinances In the third place he addeth that it was contrary to us And finally in the fourth and last place he saith that it hath been effaced abolished and fastned to the cross things these which cannot all of them together be verified of any other subject First The Law of Moses was an obligation against such as liv'd under its dispensation that is as we have explained it an evidence and â—â—â—alible argument of their sin and of the just power that GOD had to condem them unto punishment For the Law of Moses proclaiming aloud that all such as failed to observe any one of its ordinances are accursed it is manifest that they all who accepted it for the terms of their Covenant with GOD did by the same pass condemnatory sentence on themselves and submit to the curse both the conscience of each one in particular and the common experience of all in general shewing that there was not a man who punctually observed all things written in the Law And as he that passeth an obligation to his Creditor doth condemn himself to make payment and if he fail therein doth make his goods and sometimes his very person liable unto him in like manner they that receiv'd the Law and sign'd it if I may so say after they had heard and understood it these I say condemned themselves unto the curse of GOD and did put their persons and all their goods into the hands of Divine Justice since it is clear that none of them did ever fully satisfie all the clauses which that Contract doth contain Therefore as a Bond given by a Debtor to his Creditor in acknowledgment of what he ows him is an obligation which makes it clearly appear that he is responsible to him and deprives him of all excuse and leaves him no defence to thâ— contrary So the Law of Moses is an authentick obligation which demonstrates and invincibly proves that the sinner is guilty and liable to the avenging Justice of GOD without having any considerable means left him to defend himself from that punishment which it ordaineth for all such as violate its commands As for the ceremonies I grant they promised in appearance some satisfying of the Justice of GOD and some expiation of sin inasmuch as they prefigured the mysteries of CHRIST who was
fetter'd fast for ever You shall see not Arrows broken and Cuirasses batter'd and Arms cut in pieces but Sin abolish'd and Death destroy'd You shall see the spoils not of an Army or a Countrey but of the Lords of the world and of the Governours of the darkness of this Age. Lastly You shall behold in it not the image of some petty Fortress taken by assault or composition or of some River forced or some Province subdued but Hell finally beaten Heaven gained and an Eternal World brought under the power of our victorious LORD Let us apply our selves to the fruition of this magnificent spectacle and afford it all the sense and attention that we have To this end consider we First What these Principalities and Powers are which JESUS CHRIST hath spoiled And then see in the second place how he made a shew of them and triumph'd over them on the Cross These are the two Heads we will treat upon if the LORD please in this action The Apostle ordinarily makes use of the words Principalities Powers Dominions Thrones Col. 1.16 Rom. 8.37 Eph. 1.21 and Virtues to signifie the Angels as for instance in the first Chapter of this Epistle in the eighth of the Epistle to the Romans and in the first of that he wrote to the Ephesians He gives those spiritual beeings these names both because of the strength and power they are endowed with which mightily surpasseth the virtue of material and elementary things and also by reason of the divers orders into which GOD hath distinguish'd them according to the difference of their ministrations placing some of the Angels as it were Chiefs in a superiority to others And though the sin of Devils hath corrupted the perfections of their nature yet it doth appear by divers places of Scripture that it hath not quite destroyed this Order among them Satan being set forth to us as the Head of this black band and as having other evil Angels under him so as they may in this respect be still reâ—med Principalities and Powers Nevertheless there is another reason which the Apostle had his eye principally upon in giving them these names as he himself intimateth in the sixth Chapter to the Ephesians We wrestle not saith he against flesh and blood Eph. 6.12 but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickedness in high-places Here you plainly see he calleth them Principalities and Powers by reason of that Imperiality they exercise in this world under its present state of subjection unto sin and vanity Not that such a superiority doth of right belong unto them for having rebelled against their Creator they have lost all true and lawful dignity But the sin of man having â—uslav'd him to those evil spirits hath withall made these elements subject to them whereof he was the true and natural Lord. And GOD hath permitted it so to be for the executing of his justice against sin For since that man shook off the yoke of GOD having wretchedly preferr'd the pernicious counsel of his Eneâ—y before the just commandment of his Master it is but reason he should be subject to him to whom he did betray his own liberty Such then is the order or rather the confusion of the world since the fall to wit that the Devil exerciseth an insupportable â—yranny in it governing it at his pleasure as if he were Lord of it For First He worketh upon all the ungodly with wonderful force swaying their souls unto brutal passions setting on fire their lusts and by that thick smoak which he raiseth from their hearts blinding their minds and depriving them of all the light that 's necessary for distinguishing of truth and falshood Eph 2.2 of good and evil as the Apostle doth elsewhere inform us saying that this unclean spirit doth work effectually in the children of disobedience and in another place 2 Tim. 2.26 he telleth us that he hath the wicked in his snares and makes them do his will Not that he compelleth them to evil by co-active force and how much soever they dislike it but their nature being corrupted as it is he never tempteth them without effect their souls voluntarily surrendring themselves to his pernicious perswasions Moreover he disposeth of material things turning and changing them at his pleasure raising tempests in the air seditions and warrs among men putting in commotion all that murtherous violence that makes havock of mankind and presiding over all the instruments of the creatures damage and death Heb. 2.14 By reason whereof the Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews calleth Satan Him who hath the power of death And although he executeth none of his bad purposes without the permission of GOD as the Scripture clearly shews us in the History of Job where you see he toucheth neither the goods nor the children nor the person of that holy man until leave had of this Supream Majesty nevertheless because he worketh commonly in the world the greater part whereof is depraved and rebellious against GOD he seems Master of it and himself doth glory in it as when he said to our Saviour in temptation after he had shewed him all the Kingdoms of the Earth Luke 4.6 All the power and glory of these things will I give thee for to me it is delivered and I give it to whom I will And indeed for these reasons doth our Saviour stile the Devil John 12.31 and 14.30 2 Cor. 4.4 the Prince of this world as when he says Now the Prince of this world shall be cast out and so elsewhere and S. Paul calls him in the same sense the GOD of this world Represent unto your selves the world as it was under the darkness of its old Heathenism when GOD left all Nations to walk in their own ways In it the Devil absolutely domineered All those poor multitudes held he under his tyranny He had put out the eyes of their minds and in this blindness made them commit all kind of vileness and abominations He inspired into them hatred of the true GOD and of his Service and so effectually beguiled them by his fallacious illusions that he caused them to adore himself under the forms of divers Idols These same spirits are they that the Apostle intends here by those Principalities and Powers he speaks of For though the Scripture doth particularly mark out one of them whom it calleth Satan as the Head of this abominable Monarchy yet it rangeth under him a vast multitude of Spirits who all travelling upon the same design and setting on work in it all the might and industry they have do bear a part in his accursed Empire And there is great probability too that they are divided into certain bands each of which are drawn up under their particular Chiefs and do all of them depend upon Satan as their General For which reason it is that the Apostle calls them in the plural number Principalities
triumphed of his enemies in himself or by himself that is according to the ordinary stile of Scripture by his own strength and virtue he being raised from the dead and gloriously lifted up to Heaven by the potency of his own arm But I say in the second place that there is no absurdity at all in attributing these things to the very death of our LORD understanding them as we ought spiritually and mystically And without doubt it is much more fluent and clear to refer the last words of this verse to the Cross of our Saviour of which the Apostle had spoken immediately before he fastned the obligation to the Cross having spoiled Principalities and Powers over whom he triumphed on it that is on the Cross than to take it of our LORD himself and say that he triumphed over his enemies in himself which is frigid and harsh and obscure Say we then with the greater part of the Modern and with the more knowing and illustrious of the ancient Expositors that it is on the Cross our Saviour spoiled Principalities and Powers and that it was there also he publickly made a shew of them and triumphed of them I confess if we look upon him as suffering on that execrable tree amid the scoffs and sarcasms of the Jews in the lowest degree of his exinanition Flesh will find in him nothing less than victories and triumphs But you know likewise that this mystery must not be judged of by the senses of the flesh 'T is faith alone that 's able to discover and contemplate the wonders that are in it Now if you open the eyes of Faith you will easily perceive that JESUS hath spoiled all hostile powers on the Cross and that it is with this weapon properly that he surmounted those strong and potent Tyrants and took from them all the instruments of their violence and made a prey of all their riches For to say true that harsh and cruel dominion which the Devil exerciseth in the world is not founded upon any thing but sin If this pest had not infected us all the forces of Hell though they were a thousand times greater than they are could not have hurted us It 's upon our sin that this fierce Tyrant hath built all his power and it 's upon our ruins that he hath raised his grandeur For first if we were not culpable by reason of the sins we have committed the Justice of GOD would never have suffer'd this Executioner of his Judgments to trouble and prosecute us as he hath done It would not permit him so much as to open his mouth against us to accuse us But sin having provoked the wrath of GOD and his Law prohibiting access unto his Throne and pronouncing a curse upon us it 's evident that the same delivered up our persons to the evil Angels and gave them power to execute its judgment on us Again beside these evils which are termed penal and which could not terminate at last but in an eternal death the Devil did annoy men in another kind even by pushing them on to vice by his temptations and making them commit a multitude of sins some by means of avarice and others by the furies of ambition casting some into the excesses of luxury others into the disorders of drunkenness and glutny But it is sin also that gives him this power upon men to wit that Concupiscence which reigneth in them and which the Scripture calls the old man because it is the inheritance and succession and image of the first Adam It 's by this as by an handle that the Devil seizeth on them and trains them into such sins as he pleaseth Were it not for this he would have no hold upon them and each of them if he were exempted from it might say as our LORD did The Prince of this world cometh but hath nothing in me Now JESUS CHRIST hath abolish'd by his Cross both the guilt and the vices of men the guilt in that he bore the punishment thereof and satisfi'd Divine Justice for them and extinguish'd all the flamings of the Law and opened the Throne of Grace to every impenitent sinner Their vices in that he crucifi'd and destroy'd our old man on the Cross and mortifi'd all its lusts and discover'd its impostures Sure then it s by his Cross that he divested the Devils of the dominion they exercised over mankind having sapped and demolish'd all the foundations thereof by his admirable sufferings As for that which the Apostle addeth in the second place viz. that he publickly made a shew of those hostile powers this doth excellently well agree with his Cross For this shew signifieth nothing else but an extream confusion and ignominy as we have already intimated and who is there but knows that the evil Angels never receiv'd a greater than that was wherewith the Cross of our LORD and Saviour did cover them They thought to have overcome him and found themselves overcome instead of ruining his Dominion as they imagined they saw their own utterly overthrown And this was publickly done in the view of Heaven and Earth our Saviour having been crucified in the greatest City of the Orient by broad day and at the solemnity of the most sacred Festival the Jews had The Angels look'd on it from on high and never beheld any thing with more attention and astonishment Jews and Gentiles were spectators of it and Nature it self however mute and insensible sufficiently shew'd that it took part in it shutting if we may so say its eye through the horror it had to see its Creator suffer But fear not poor Creatures The shame and confusion will wholly remain to our Enemies Our Sun will soon come out of this Eclipse and his suffering is the salvation not the ruin or damage of the Universe In fine the Apostle's further assertion in the last place that our LORD triumphed over these hostile powers on the Cross is easily verifi'd also For Origen as an Ancient said There were two crucified persons on that Cross the one JESUS CHRIST who was nailed to it visibly voluntarily and for a short time only the other the Devil invisibly fastned to the same Cross and to his great regret and for ever in as much as this Cross of our Saviour hath destroy'd his life and power having given him that deadly blow whereof he will never recover Faith seeth upon the Cross above the Son of GOD combating and conquering for us and it sees beneath all the bad Angels put in chains vanquished and in vain raging under his feet Yet do I ingenuously confess that to speak properly the resurrection and ascension of our LORD have more analogy with a triumph than his death which doth rather resemble a conflict But it 's a very common manner of speech to attribute the name of an effect to the cause which produced it It 's in my opinion principally in this sense that our Saviour triumphed of his enemies on the Cross because the
CHRIST hath given us in raising us again with Himself doth oblige us These thoughts and works of Heaven are necessary productions of the principles and faculties of that life unto which we have been raised up You can neither be Christians without having part in the resurrection of our LORD nor have part in His resurrection except you walk with Him and wear that lightsome robe of sanctity wherewith He vesteth all the associates of His resurrection He Himself calleth us hereto from that lofty Throne whereon He sitteth at the right hand of GOD Faithful soul saith He to each of us look unto me and I will give thee light Fear not for I govern the Heavens and the earth Only fix thine eyes thy thoughts and thine heart on me and I will guide thee by my counsel and receive thee one day into my glory Dear Brethren this He doth promise us and of this He will give us earnest next LORD's-day at His holy table Let us do what He demands of us or to say better let us pray Him to do it in us and He will assuredly do what He promiseth us Unto Him unto the Father and unto the Holy Spirit the true and only GOD blessed for ever be honour praise and glory to ages of ages Amen THE THIRTY THIRD SERMON ON COLOSSIANS CHAP. III. VER III IV. Verse III. For ye are dead and your life is hid with CHRIST in GOD. IV. When CHRIST who is your life shall appear then shall ye also appear with Him in glory DEAR Brethren The LORD JESUS being not only the author and the cause but also the pattern and exemplar of that great Salvation which GOD of His infinite mercy offereth to mankind in the Gospel it is not possible that we should have part in it or assuredly enter into this rich possession without having in us a resemblance of the same soveraign LORD and being as so many copies of this Divine Original where all His features and lineaments may appear though in a form and measure much less perfect and eminent than His. Rom. 8.28 Of this the Apostle expresly informeth us in his Epistle to the Romans saying that those whom GOD did fore-know that is love and discriminate from the rest of men according to His good pleasure to communicate really faith and eternal salvation unto them He did also predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son Heb. 2.12 13. For this cause He doth us the honour to call us sometimes His children and sometimes His brethren by reason of the resemblance we have with Him the nature the condition the quality and as 't is commonly termed the fortune of children following the fathers and of brethren being like their elder brothers Whence the Apostle concludes in the Epistle to the Hebrews that He who sanctifyeth that is the LORD JESUS Heb. 8.11 and they who are sanctified that is the faithful are all of one that is of one and the same mass of one and the same form and nature And to make it plain to us the Scripture compareth Him sometimes to a Vine-stock Jo. 15. Rom. 11. otherwhile to an Olive-tree of each of which we are branches all of them things between which there is by nature a strict communion the one and the others having the same constitution and qualities And thence again it is that Saint Paul calleth Him our first-fruits when speaking of our death and the resurrection which is to succeed it he saith that CHRIST was made the first fruits of them that slâ—ep 1 Cor. 15.20 the first-fruits as you know being of the same condition and nature with the rest of those things out of the mass whereof they are taken Now although this consormity of the faithful with the LORD JESUS be of a large extent yet it doth principally appear in two heads wherein the Scripture doth particularly consider it to wit in His Death and in His Resurrection the happy remembrance whereof we have celebrated this morning For the death of JESUS CHRIST hath produced a death like it in all true believers reducing them by its efficacy and virtue unto a state conform to His when He was stretched out on the Cross and lay in the Sepulchre In like manner His Resurrection transmitteth into them a life like that which He resumed when having overcome death He issued out of His grave His Death is not only the cause but also the pattern of ours and likewise His Life is both the principle and exemplar of ours It 's of this death and this life Dearly beloved Brethren the effect and the image of the Death and Resurrection of the LORD that we make account to entertain you in this action For after our having celebrated the memory of the death and resurrection of this Great Saviour and participated of the one and the other by the vertue of His Spirit and our Faith what can we more pertinently meditate than the precious fruit which each of them produceth in us and the images of the one and the other of these mysteries which this Divine dead and again risen perâ—â—â— doth draw and form in us inasmuch as He changeth us after a sort into Himself by an impression of His omnipotent vertue so as if we have truly receiv'd Him we are become dead and risen again with Him St. Paui teacheth us this excellent and saving truth in the series of our ordinary Texts by these words which we have read for the subject of this exercise In those that preceded which we expounded eight daies since this great Apostle drew us from the earth that he might elevate us to Heaven where JESUS sitteth at the right hand of the Father Seek saith he the things which are above and not the things which are on the earth But because he knew how difficult such a transportation would be for persons who are still so many waies fastned to the earth to work so high a design thoroughly into us besides the reasons already represented which were taken from our resurrection with the LORD and from His presence and glorious soveraignty in the places he would elevate us to he further proposes two more for that end in this passage The one taken from our death For saith he ye are dead and the other from that new life which we have received a life hidden it 's true for the present in GOD but such as will be plainly and plenarily discovered one day at the manifestation of the LORD JESUS Your life saith he is hid with CHRIST in GOD. When CHRIST c. These are the two principal points we will treat of in this action the grace of our LORD assisting and Him we invocate praying that this word of His may be effectually in us His power to salvation throughly changing us into the similitude both of His salutary death and of His glorious life that being dead unto our selves we may not live henceforth but in Him unto His honour and the edification
notable is the elogium he gives it in saying Covetousness which is idolatry For this title surpriseth us every one well knowing that idolatry and covetousness are to speak properly two different sins the first directly respecting religion and the service of the Deity when men adore a thing which is not the true GOD and render it those religious honours which belong to none but GOD whereas covetousness is a moral sin that consists in an excessive and immoderate adhesion to the goods of this world makes men get them and possess them amiss and contrary to the laws of justice and reason These two things therefore being so different why saith St. Paul that covetousness is idolatry Dear Brethren I answer that he was in no wise ignorant of this nor did he intend in this place to confound these two sins which in divers other places he does most expresly discriminate and distinguish as particularly there where making a list of the principal sinners that shall not inherit the kingdom of GOD he sets down the idolater and the covetous severally and each of them in his rank But aiming here in passing to brand and blast this vice for the giving of us a just horror at it that we might not account it as the greater part of men do a light matter and a lowness and weakness of spirit rather than a crime he qualifies it with the elogium of idolatry improperly I grant and figuratively but very fitly for the discovering of its venoum to us And it is not here alone that he hath done it He brands this vice after the same manner again in the Epistle to the Ephesians where speaking of the covetous he adds the very same thing and says who is an idolater You know saith he that no fornicator nor unclean person nor covetous who is an idolater hath any inheritance in the kingdom of CHRIST and of GOD. Now this proposition that covetousnesse is idolatry may be pertinently resolved two manner of waies First by taking it as signifying simply that it is an abominable thing For inasmuch as there was nothing in all the horrors of Paganism that was more severely prohibited of GOD nor more hated or abhorred among the Jews than idolatry thence it comes that they gave this name to every thing which they would detest and I perceive that even to this day this form of expression is common among them and when they would signifie that a thing is abominable they frequently say It 's an idol or it is idolatry so that we need not wonder if St. Paul who followeth all the idioms and terms of the Jews language hath said here in a like sense that covetousnesse is idolatry to signifie that it 's an horrible and detestable vice We meet with a like expression or rather indeed the same in Samuel when the Prophet to shew Saul how great the horror was of the fault he had committed in not executing punctually the thing GOD had commanded him tells him 1 Sam. 15.23 that to resist an order of the LORD's is a sin of divination that is of witchcraft or magick and not to acquiesce in what He hath commanded is a sin of idols or images that is idolatry There you see by the names of the most abominable sins witchcraft and idolatry he signifies the horridnesse of disobeying the voice of GOD altogether as the Apostle in our Text expresseth the horridnesse of avarice I add in the second place that though covetousnesse be not properly and formally Idolatry yet it hath so much resemblance with it that there is scarce any other sin to which this name doth better agree The idolater looks on his idols with profound veneration so doth the covetous on his goods and coin The one shuts up his idols so the other doth his The one serves an image and the other gold and silver and when the idol is of either of these two metals as they not seldome are they both serve the self-same thing with this difference only that the idolater serves it under one form and one way figured the covetous under another The one offers incense and sacrifices to his idol the other immolates his heart and affections to his Add hereto that the covetous bears more love to the objects of his passion and renders them more service than he doth to GOD He puts his hope in gold and saith to fine gold Thou art my considence And if you thoroughly examine his life you will find that he serves none but Mammon Mammon is then his GOD after the same manner as the Apostle saith else-where that the holly is the GOD of voluptuous men whence follows that it cannot be denied but that he also is an idolater In fine there are two things here to be yet heeded The first is that under the names of these five vices fornication uncleannesse inordinate appetite evil concupiscence and covetousnesse the Apostle signifies not meerly the acts of these sins which are also commonly called by the same names but properly and precisely the internal habits of them as seated in the soul For it 's they properly that are the members of the old man the acts are but his effects and operations His meaning therefore is that we cut them up to the very root that we not only abstain from those vile actions unto which they sway such as they possesse but that we mortifie and extinguish them themselves to the end that these accursed sources or evil being once dried up our life may remain 〈◊〉 and clean from all the ordures and filth of them The other thing is that we must not fancy the Apostle meant to make here an exact enumeration of all the vices of the old man He gives us but a small scantling of them intending we should likewise mortifie all the rest as gluttony drunkennesse and the like For it would be no benefit to us to have cut off one of his members if we let him live in respect of others His life is our death and while he conserves it whole in any of his parts we cannot be in safety Let us labour therefore to extinguish it all Eradicate all its lusts represse all its stirrings and smother all its sentiments Let us make a mortal and irreconcilable war upon this whole brood of monsters Spare we not any one of them Let us exterminate them all as an Anathema Treating them as the ancient Israelites sometime did the accursed nations of Canaan and as the Psalmist would have the little children of Babilon treated Psal 137.9 desiring they might be dash'd against the stones It 's in this case only that cruelty is laudable and that a man may lay aside pity without blame He that hath pity on the members of his old man is cruel to himself to spare them is to destroy ones self and to conserve them is to betray our own salvation This then My Brethren is the mortification which the Apostle requireth of us Neither he nor
not to be doubted but that the precipitaâ—ed deaths and ruines of so many great ones whom the world hath seen and still doth see perish with astonishment are for the most part from the same source even the debauches they have been carried into The accidents of particular houses and persons infected with this leaprousie are less marked yet are they nevertheless very remarkable And he that shall look narrowly into them shall find in them admirable examples of the justice of GOD upon these kind of sins and this in special that He commonly takes away His covenant from houses where such disorders reign I might easily let you see like foot-steps of the wrath of GOD upon the covetous whose unrighteousnesse He often punisheth with loss of senses of health of honour and of that very wealth which they love much better than their bodies and their souls themselves not to speak of the infamy which GOD sometimes poureth out upon them and the horrible miseries into which He lets them fall in their persons and in their posterity But I must pass to the other part of this Text and speak a few words of it and conclude For the Apostle after this wrath of GOD which he hath represented as falling from Heaven upon the children of rebellion because of their pollutions and avarices reminds the Colossians that themselves had sometime been in the same condition in which saith he you also walked other-while when ye lived in these things To live in these sins is to have the principles of our life infected with the venome of them To walk in them is to produce the actions of them The one is the power and faculty of life the other is the exercise and function of it For the having in ones self the principles and faculties of life this the Apostle termeth living and by walking he understands a putting forth the actions of the same as appears plainly by his saying elsewhere If we live in the Spirit let us also walk in the Spirit For a man that Gal. 5.25 for instance is asleep does nevertheless live and hath life though he performeth not the actions of it As therefore to live in the Spirit is no other thing but to have the faculties and powers of our nature renewed and as it were new-east and regenerated by the vertue of the Spirit of JESUS CHRIST so on the contrary to live in sin is in like manner to have our understanding and will and the other powers of our nature putrified and corrupted and as it were empoisoned with Adam's sin by the contagion of his flesh And again as those do walk in the Spirit who exercise piety and sanctity and do conduct all the actions and motions of their lives according to the will of the Spirit so they on the contrary walk in sin who follow and fulfill the lusts thereof and employ themselves in no other exercise but the serving it and doing those evil works which naturally flow from the habitudes of it But we have spoken largely heretofore if you remember of this first life of old Adam which the grace of the LORD JESUS hath destroyed and mortified in us We have only to observe in our way that since the exercise of man in his state of nature before grace is to walk in vices and in grossest pollutions it must be an huge error to imagine that he should be able in such a state to produce works either meritorious as some say or preparatory to grace as others do pretend All he doth for this time if you believe the Apostle in the case is not good but to prepare for Hell and merit the wrath of GOD and to have any other opinion of it will be a diminution of the greatnesse of the grace of GOD towards us Let us think then Beloved Brethren on that shameful and miserable estate in which we naturally were and should have continued for ever with the children of rebellion living and walking in sins the wages and fruit whereof could be no other than eternal death if the LORD through His abundant grace had not delivered us from such a condemnation And resenting as we ought the greatness of the benefit He hath conferr'd upon us let us incessantly bless His mercy and goodness Thanks be ever rendred unto thee O holy and merciful LORD for that we being servants of sin thou hast made us free by Thy Son and given us by thy Spirit Rom. 6.17 to obey that express form of doctrine which hath been delivered us by thy servants But as heretofore the vices in which we lived did continually produce all kind of pollutions and sins and henceforth since the cross and grace of our LORD hath dried up this source of impurity let there no more appear any track of them in our manners Let the holyness of that new man whose name and blood we boast of shine forth in all the actions of our lives Above all let us banish thence those two capital and accursed pests of luxury and avarices for which you have heard here before all the mouths of Heaven opened to fulminate against the rebellious that serve them the curses of this world and of that which is to come And if the ignorance of such as lived in error withheld not the wrath of GOD heretofore from coming on them for these two kinds of sins what must those expect now who commit the same crimes in the light of JESUS CHRIST Sure as much as the disobedience and the rebellion of the one is more grievous and more enormous than that of others so much more terrible will be the wrath that shall pour from Heaven upon them than all the judgements of GOD the world hath seen in time past Your ingratitude Christian who so ill brook your name and your disobedience surpasseth in horridnesse all the unbelief both of the first world and of ancient Israel they rejected but the preaching of Noah and the ministry of Mâ—ses whereas you outrage the Gospel of the Son of GOD and as much is in you is make Him a lyer Yet you know how they were punished you know the deluges which the fault of the one brought upon all the earth You know the abysse opened its mouth to swallow up the others alive Heaven and earth and the elements were armed against them If their punishment makes you tremble why do you imitate their faults yea why commit you such as are more hainous and blacker than theirs GOD is good and merciful I acknowledge but to sinners repenting To those that mock at His instruction and make a jest of His menaces He is severe and inexorable And if they amend not they shall know sooner or later to their cost that it 's a fearful thing to fall into His hands But the LORD JESUS whom we invocate please to give us better things so reforming this Church by the power of His Spirit and of His voice that henceforth these crying sins be no more seen
the LORD JESUS giving thanks by Him unto our GOD and Father DEAR Brethren The love that the LORD JESUS hath born us is so great and the benefits He hath conferr'd upon us are so various and so precious that we are evidently obliged to give our selves entirely to Him and we cannot substract from Him without ingratitude any part of what we are or have He hath laid down His life for us It is just therefore that we again do consecrate ours unto Him He hath redeemed us at the price of His blood and by this admirable ransom deliver'd from death and hell not only our Souls but also our Bodies and our whole Nature We are therefore wholly His and have no more any other Master but Him neither is there any justice in the world but will adjudge Him the propriety and possession of what costeth Him so dear But though of right we be his Vassals yet it hath pleas'd His love that we should belong to Him under another much more glorious title For He hath made us His brethren having obtained of His Father that He should adopt us for His children and accumulated this grace with all the highest favours that creatures can be exalted to I mean He hath made us partakers of His inheritance and communicated to us His Nature and His Spirit and crowned us with His immortality and with His glory Though he had not shed His Blood for us as He did who seeth not but that this His great and divine liberality should have purchas'd Him all the life and being and motion we can have and that to divert any part of it from His service would be a robbing of Him and a bereaving Him with abominable Sacriledge of a thing belonging to Him so legitimatly and for many so just and weighty reasons If we be not the most unjust and ingrateful persons in the world we ought all to have such sentiments and consequently look upon our nature and our life as things no longer ours but JESUS CHRIST's and dispose of them not after our own phansie and for our own interest but at His pleasure and for His glory And as you see that the servants of a Prince above all those whom he hath particularly obliged and favoured do set up his arms through all their houses and adorn their Halls and Chambers with his Picture and have his praises alwayes in their mouth and fill up their whole life with his name and glory so should we do to JESUS CHRIST and with so much the more zeal for that He is a LORD infinitely more rich more clement more liberal and more beneficent than any Monarch of the Earth Let our Souls and Bodies therefore bear His badges let His glory appear exalted in all our actions let the words of our mouths be dedicated to Him and our whole lives full of His Name breathing throughout nothing but His honour and service without ever swerving from His Will from His interests This Beloved Brethren is the Lesson which the Apostle S. Paul now gives us in the words that you have heard And whatever ye do saith he whether in word or work do it all in the name of the LORD JESVS giving thanks by Him unto our GOD and Father By these words he concludeth that excellent exhortation which he makes to all Christians in general of what sex or age or condition soever He began it at the first Verse of this Chapter and continues it on to our Text pointing out in it briefly but divinely as you have heard in the precedent exercises our principal duties on one hand the mortifying of the flesh with its lusts as fornication covetousness wrath and the like on the other hand the studying and exercising of all Christian vertues as humility kindness patience gentleness charity and peace To all these he addeth our knowing and continual meditating of the Word of GOD with Psalms and spiritual Hymns And here it was we made stay in our last action upon this Subject Now that he might not stand to treat severally of all a Christians other duties which would be prolix and even infinite and a Discourse of too great extent for an Epistle before he passeth to that particular exhortation which he addresseth in the following Verses to some certain ranks of believers as to Married persons to Fathers to Children to Servants and Masters he closeth up his first matter with the precept he here gives us A precept verily excellent and well worthy to Crown his exhortation since it comprehends in few words all the duties of a Christian both those which the Apostle hath expresly pointed at and those which his design of brevity caused him to pass over in silence without speaking of them by name To the end we may give you an exposition of it we will endeavour by the grace of our LORD to explain one after another the two parts that offer themselves in it First that whatever we do either in word or work we do it all in the name of the LORD JESVS Secondly that we give thanks by Him to our GOD and Father When the Apostle pronounceth that all we do in work or word be done in the name of the LORD JESVS he clearly gives Him our whole life For these two sorts of things which he subjecteth unto Him words and works do comprehend all the other parts of our life it being evident that nothing issues from us but what may be referred to the one or the other of these two kinds They are either words or works Words are the fruits of our mouths works are the effects or actions of our other parts and faculties I acknowledge that beside this our spirit also does act within us when it knows or considers things and desireth or rejecteth them But besides that these internal actions might be put into the rank of our works by extending the word a little beyond its ordinary signification as in effect some interpreters do give it such a meaning here beside this I say it is evident that most of the conceptions and affections and resolutions of the Soul do refer to words and external works as being the principles and motives of them For it is not possible that our words and works should be in the name of our LORD and Saviour except our understandings and wills do so address them and it 's properly this action of the Soul the Apostle signifies when he orders that we do in the name of CHRIST all we do The tongue indeed pronounceth the words and the hands and other parts of our bodies do execute those actions of ours which are called works But it 's the Spirit that moves them all and that directeth and guideth on their functions to that end or design it hath proposed to its self and draws them from such motives as it hath conceiv'd and form'd within its self And it is properly upon this that the difference of mens actions doth depend It 's this Character that gives them
two things namely first the corruption of a nature destitute of all just and rational apprehensions and motions and secondly the guilt of sin and an obligâ—tion to eternal punishment In like manner that life to which GOD calleth us by his grace doth consist in two particulars first a restauration of His Image in us by the infusion of principles and faculties of true life and secondly the remission of our sins The Apostle here doth briefly speak of them both of the first in saying that GOD hath quickned us together with CHRIST of the second in adding that he hath freely pardoned us all our sins For the first GOD hath quickned us in that delivering us from the death we were under he hath put into us by the grace of his Spirit the principles of an heavenly life and formed in our breasts new hearts hearts illuminated with a new light to wit the good knowledg of his Truth and of the mysteries of his will Then in the second place by the virtue of this Divine flame he enkindleth in our souls the love of his most excellent Majesty charity towards our neighbour uâ—â—ection for just and honest things zeal for his glory abhorrence and hatred of sin and in a word sanctification and all the virtues which it comprehendeth that are the sproutings and productions of this second celestial and happy life which in his great mercy he conferreth on us From this new nature as from a blessed root do issue good and holy actions prayer worshipping of GOD frequent meditation and reading of his word extasies of love to him travels for his glory sufferings for his Name sake relieving instructing assisting of our Neighbour and such others that are as it were the flowers and fruits in the production whereof that life which GOD hath given us in his Son doth properly consist It 's the same thing that the Apostle elsewhere compriseth in few words saying Eph. 2.10 and 4.24 that we are the workmanship of GOD being created in JESVS CHRIST unto good works which GOD hath prepared that we should walk in them And again in another place that our new man that is the second nature which he formeth in us when he quickneth us by his grace is created after GOD in true righteousness and holiness The holy Spirit being rich and magnificent in its expressions doth explain this admirable and blessed operation of the grace of GOD in us by divers terms taken from different resemblances but all amounting to the same sense For to set it forth it saith not only as here that GOD hath quickned us but also Eph. 2.10 1 Pet. 1.3 Ezek. 36.26 Jer. 31.33 Rom. 11 23. Col. 1.13 1 Cor 3.6 Acts 16.4 Phil. 2.13 that He hath created us and in another place that He hath begotten us again the same is meant when it saith that GOD taketh out of us our hearts of stone and gives us hearts of flesh in which he writes his laws that He reneweth us and formeth us into new creatures or new men that He graffeth us by his power into the true olive that He translateth us out of the kingdom of darkness into his marvellous light that it 's He who giveth encrease the Ministers of the Word being nothing that He openeth our hearts and worketh in us effectually both to will and to do of his good pleasure and other like phrases which are found here and there in the Scriptures But the Apostle addeth here that GOD hath thus quickned us together with CHRIST shewing us by these words the cause and the manner of our vivisication namely that it was effected in JESUS CHRIST and with Him and by Him For as that death which we heretofore bore in our selves doth come from Adam the stock and original of our carnal beeing who by destroying himself destroyed us also with him and corrupting his own nature corrupted ours likewise so as it is in him and from him that we inherit this misery in like manner on the contrary that life which we have now receiv'd from GOD doth come from JESUS CHRIST the stock and root of the new nature who raising up himself unto life raised us up also according to what the Apostle saith elsewhere viz. that as all dye in Adam so likewise in JESVS CHRIST are all made alive But this assertion of his here that GOD hath quickned us together with CHRIST 1 Cor. 15.22 doth particularly refer to his resurrection as if GOD in restoring him to that glorious life which he receiv'd at his issuing out of the Sepulcher had at the same time given us also part therein And he speaks in this manner for two reasons principally The first is because it was then that JESUS CHRIST brought to light that blessed life whereof we have been made partakers and from him as from its source hath it been derived unto us so as that same time was the day of our new birth as well as his For if he had not been made alive no more should we have ever been Not but that the Father all had the might and power that was necessary to give us life again But his Justice could not have suffer'd him to give life to any of the sons of men if their Surety and Mediator had abode under death The second reason is That he being our Head and we his Members he our Pattern and we Copies drawn if I may so say from his Original when GOD raised him he re-enliven'd us also by the same means since by this action he obliged himself to vivifie us likewise it being evident that without this we should not have that conformity with our Head to which he predestinated us Not to mention for the present the efficacy this Resurrection hath to form in us faith and hope and love of glorious immortality which are the principles of that new life that GOD doth put into us by his Spirit as we intimated in the exposition of the precedent Verse There remains now the other part of this blessed life which GOD giveth us in his Son namely the remission of our sins S. Paul sets it before us here when he saith that GOD hath freely pardoned us all our sins For the Spirit of Sanctification which is as the soul of that new life he createth in our hearts doth indeed turn away our affections from vice and obstruct our committing of unjust ungodly and impure actions wherein we wallowed afore Yet this respecteth only the present and the future and if there were no more the guilt of sins committed in time past during our spiritual deadness would nevertheless remain in its strength it being clear that though the act of sin be past the faultiness wherewith it commaculates him who committeth it goes not off so soon It subsists still both in the conscience of the sinner if he have any and in the registers of the Justice of the Supream Judg of the World binding over the sinner unto punishment Whence it follows
that supposing a man be perfectly cured of vicious habits and inclinations yet would he nevertheless be faulty by reason of his fore-passed sins and consequently liable upon this account unto the curse with which and the terrors that precede it true life is so incompatible that it is not imaginable a man in such a state could ever resolve to serve GOD freely and sincerely Therefore GOD that he may throughly quicken us doth not only deliver us from the tyranny of vice and of the flesh by that Princely Spirit which he poureth into our inward parts but moreover pardoneth us all the sins whereof we are guilty and it seems in very deed if we do accurately observe the moments of his action in us that it 's there he does begin first remitting our former offences to the end that the sense of this goodness of His may cause us to love him and encline us to obey him and conform our selves with all our might unto his holy will The Apostle attributeth unto this remission two remarkable qualities One that GOD forgiveth us all our offences that is doth not impute to us any of our sins either in whole or in part but treateth us as if we had committed none at all Another is that he doth it freely and of meer grace for so doth the word giving used here in the Original properly signifie as our Translation hath well express'd by rendring He hath freely forgiven us The Scripture tells us not of any other kind of pardon For as to that which our Adversaries do assert to wit whereby the fault is remitted but the punishment exacted either in whole or in part or is bought out with the payment of our own satisfactions or the satisfactions of others it's a figment of their own Schools of which the Holy Ghost says nothing any where but represents unto us all that remission which GOD gives the faithful either at the beginning or in the progress of their regeneration as an entire pardon and purely gratuitous As for that satisfaction by which our LORD and Saviour obtained it for us it is so far from any way diminishing that it does infinitely exalt the bounty of GOD towards us since that he so loved us as that he might pardon our faults with the consent of his Justice he would have his only Son to shed his precious blood for the contenting thereof This is that we had to deliver upon this Text of the Apostle's Dear Brethren Let us hold fast what it hath taught us of the condition that all men are naturally in before GOD calleth them to his grace Let not their outward appearance deceive you nor the pleasures of their flesh nor the splendor of their pretended virtues either civil or moral All this is but a false image of life covering a carkass that 's stinking and abominable before GOD. Make account that they are dead and that if they walk it is not a true principle of life but sin the poyson of life which doth animate them and set them on working The issue will one day clear it to us all when the just judgment of GOD having stript them of that fallacious disguise which now hideth the hideousness of their nature shall shew it before Heaven and Earth and make us plainly see that they were but Sepulchers whited without and full of filth and infection within and cast them thereupon into that wretched and eternal death which is prepared for them with the Devil and his Angels Bless we GOD who hath deliver'd us from this perdition by his great mercy and hate we sin and the corruption of the flesh which had involv'd us in it Look we on them as pests and poysons that destroy our life and reckon we that we have liv'd no more time than what hath been exempted from our serving of them You deceive your self Worldling who count the days of your unclean pleasures or your vain honours the best part of your life To say plainly it was the time of your being dead and not of your being alive After so many years as you have tumbled up and down the earth you have not yet liv'd a moment You have all along been in a state of death And they that write upon your Tombs that you liv'd so many years and died such a day do grosly err You did not live when you offended GOD and your Neighbour or lost your time in the filth of your infamous delights And on the day that you shall quit the earth you will not cease to live for to say true you never liv'd but from one kind of death you will pass into another from the death of sin to a death of torment Christians if you love life and hate horror at death renounce sin and mortifie your flesh You cannot live except it dye Put in exercise that noble life which the LORD hath given you in his Son Act according to the Principles which he hath put into you by his Spirit and lay forth continually in good and holy works the Graces wherewith he hath vested you Faithfully love and serve him Let your minds meditate on nothing beside him your hearts desire none but him your tongues speak only of him Let the contemplation of the wonders of his love and the hopes of his glory be the whole food of your souls Respect those men in whom you see his Image shine Affect them and serve them for his sake looking upon their lives their estates their honour their bodies and souls as sacred and inviolable things Endeavour to enrich them by communicating of your prosperities unto them Offend no man Do good to all Let your charity and your innocence be conspicuous in the sight of GOD and Man Faithful Brethren This is that life truly worthy to be called life which GOD doth reward for the present with a joy and contentment of Conscience that 's a thousand times more sweet and savoury than any of the vain delights of the world and which he will crown one day with that glorious Immortality he hath promised It 's for this that he hath vouchsafed to forgive us freely all our offences all those so many horrible Crimes which had merited Hell-fire and is still ready to pardon all the sins we have committed since This so great and admirable loving-kindness of his tendeth only to withdraw us from sin and oblige us to love and revere so good a GOD. It 's for the self-same end that he hath raised up his Son from the dead and enliven'd us with him giving us faith hope and charity the principles of a new life even that henceforth renouncing sin and the flesh and turning our hearts towards Heaven where our treasure and our glory is we might live soberly righteously and godly in the present world looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great GOD and Saviour JESUS CHRIST Amen The Twenty-fifth SERMON COL CHAP. II. VER XIV Ver. xiv Having effaced the obligation