PREFACE.

SUCH is the divine matter and admirable order of the Lord’s Prayer, as became the eternal wisdom of God, that composed and dictated it to his disciples. In it are opened the fountains of all our regular petitions, and the arguments contained to encourage our hopes for obtaining them. In our addresses to men, our study is to conciliate their favourable audience; but God is most graciously inclined and ready to grant our requests, therefore we are directed to call upon him by the title of ‘Our Father in heaven,’ to assure us of his love and power, and thereby to excite our reverent attention, to raise our affections, to confirm our confidence in prayer. The supreme end of our desires is the glory of God, in conjunction with our own happiness: this is expressed in the two first petitions, that ‘his name may be hallowed,’ and ‘his kingdom come,’ that we may partake of its felicity. In order to this, our desires are directed for the means that are proper and effectual to accomplish it. And those are of two kinds—the good things that conduct us, and the removal of those evils that obstruct our happiness. The good things are either, the spiritual and principal means to prepare us for glory, an entire, cordial, and constant obedience to the divine commands, expressed in the third petition, ‘Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven;’ or, natural and subservient, the supports and comforts of this life, which are contained in the fourth petition, ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ The removal of evils is disposed according to the order of the good things we are to seek: we pray that our sins may be forgiven, the guilt of which directly excludes from his glorious kingdom; that we may be preserved from temptations, that with draw us from observing the divine commands; and to be delivered from all afflicting evils, that hinder our arrival at our blessed end. The conclusion is to strengthen our faith, by ascribing to our heavenly Father, the kingdom, power, and glory, and to express our ardent desires of his blessing, by saying, Amen.

This divine comprehensive prayer is the subject of the following sermons, wherein the characters of Dr Manton’s spirit are so conspicuous, as sufficiently discover them to be his; and the reader is assured they have been diligently compared with his own copy.

WILLIAM BATES.

INTRODUCTION.

But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet; and when thou hast shut the door, pray to thy Father, &c.—Mat. VI. 6-8.

I INTEND to go over the Lord’s Prayer; and, to make way for it, I shall speak a little of these foregoing verses, wherein our Lord treats of the duty of prayer, and the necessity of being much therein.

In the beginning of this chapter our Lord taxeth the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, which was plainly to be seen in all their duties their alms, their prayers, and their fasting.

I. For their alms: Christ deals with that in the first four verses. It seems it was their fashion, when they gave alms, to sound a trumpet; and their pretence was to call all the poor within hearing, or to give notice that such a rabbi giveth alms to-day. Now, our Lord showeth that though this were the fair pretence to call the poor, yet their heart was merely upon their own glory, their own esteem with men; and therefore he persuades his disciples to greater secrecy in this work, and to content themselves with God’s approbation, which will be open, and manifest, and honourable enough in due time, when the archangel shall blow the trumpet to call all the world together, 1 Thes. iv. 16, and Christ shall publish their good works in the hearing of men and angels: Mat. xxv. 34-36. Thus he deals with them upon the point of alms.

II. For their prayers: Christ taxeth their affectation of applause, because they sought out places of the greatest resort,—the synagogues and corners of the streets,—and there did put themselves into a praying posture, that they might be seen of men, and appear to be persons of great devotion, and so might the better accomplish their own ends, their public designs upon the stage (for the Pharisees were great sticklers at that time), and also their private designs upon widows’ houses, that they might be trusted with the management of widows’ and orphans’ estates, as being devout men, and of great sanctity and holiness.

In which practice there was a double failing:—

1. As to the circumstance of place, performing a personal and solitary prayer in a public place, which was a great indecorum, and argued the action to be scenical, or brought upon the stage merely for public applause. And certainly that private praying which is used by men in churches doth justly come under our Lord’s reproof.

2. Their next failing was as to their end: ‘Verily they do it to be seen of men.’

Object. But what fault was there in this? Doth not Christ himself direct us, in his Sermon, Mat. v. 16, ‘Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven’? And yet the Pharisees are here taxed for praying, fasting, and giving alms, that they might be seen of men; how can these places stand together?

By way of answer:—

1. We must distinguish of the different scope and intention of Christ in these two places. There, Christ’s scope is to commend and enjoin good works to be seen of men, ad edificationem, for their edification; here, his scope is to forbid us to do good works to be seen of men, ad ostentationem, for our own ostentation: There, Christian charity to the souls of men is commended; and here, vainglory is forbidden.

2. Again, good works are to be distinguished. Some are so truly and indeed; others only in outward show and appearance. Good works, that are truly so and indeed, Christ enjoins there; hypocritical and feigned acts, that are only so in outward show and semblance, are forbidden here. To pray is a good work, take inward and outward acts of it together, and so it is enjoined. But hypocritical and superstitious prayer, which hath only the face and show of goodness, this is forbidden.

3. We must distinguish of the ends of good works; principal and subordinate; adequate and inadequate. First, the principal and primary end of good works must not be that we may be seen of men, but the glory of God; but now the subordinate, or less principal end, may be to be seen of men. Again, it must not be our adequate end, that is, our whole and main intention and scope; but a collateral and side end it may be. It is one thing to do good works, only that they may be seen; it is another thing to do good works, that they may not only be seen, but also be imitated, to win others by them to give glory to God. It is one thing to do good works for the glory of God, another thing to do them for the glory of ourselves. We may do good works to be seen in the first respect, but not in the last. We may not pray with the Pharisees merely to be seen of men, yet we may let our light shine before men, to draw them to duty, and give more glory to God.

4. Again, there Christ speaks of the general bent of our conversation, and here only of particular and private duties. It would argue too much hypocrisy to do these in public, though the whole frame and course of our carriage before men must be religious in their sight. And that is agreeable to what the apostle saith, 2 Cor. viii. 21, ‘We should provide for honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men.’ And, Phil. ii. 15, Christians are advised there to be ‘blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, shining among them as lights in the world.’ That which is obvious to the sight and observance of men, must be such as will become our holy calling. But our private and particular duties, which are to pass between God and us, these must be out of sight. I hope another man may approve himself to be honest and religious to me, though he doth not fall down and make his personal and private prayers before me. But to leave no scruple, if possible;

5. We must distinguish of the diverse significations of that phrase which is used here, ὁπῶς, that we may be seen. There is a twofold sense of ὁπῶς, or that. It may be taken two ways, as they speak, either causally or eventually. Causally, and then it implies and imports the end and scope why we do such a thing, namely, for this very purpose, that we may obtain it. And thus the Pharisees here did pray, ὁπῶς, that they might be seen of men, that is, this was their main end and scope. Thus that is taken causally. Secondly, that sometimes is taken eventually, and then it doth not import the end and scope, but only the event that will fall out and follow upon such a thing. Thus that is often taken in scripture. John ix. 39: Christ saith there, ‘For judgment I am come into the world, that they which see not, might see; and that they which see, might be made blind.’ It was not Christ’s scope to do so, but Christ foresaw that this would be the event of his coming into the world, and, therefore, he saith, that, &c. So Luke xiv. 10: Christ tells them there, ‘But when thou art bidden to a feast, go and sit down in the lowest room, that when he that bade thee comes, he may say unto thee, Friend, go up higher: then shalt thou have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee.’ That is taken eventually, not causally; for Christ doth not bid them there to set themselves at the lower end of the table, for this very end, or to make this their scope: that is the thing he forbids—affectation of precedency; but that, hoc est, then it will follow, that is, this is likely to be the event; then the master of the house will come to you if you do this. Not that it should be your scope to feign humility, that you may obtain the highest place at the table. And so may Christ’s words be taken, ‘Let your light so shine.’ &c. This will fall out upon it then—men will be conscious to your Christian carriage and gracious behaviour, and by that means God will be much honoured and glorified. There it is taken eventually, but here it is taken causally. The Pharisees did it that they might be seen of men; that is, this was their scope and principal intention. And thus may you reconcile these two places of scripture.

Well, now, Christ having taxed them for these two faults: for their undue place, the synagogue and corners of the streets being unfit for a private and personal act of worship; and for their end, that they might be seen of men,—he saith, ‘They have their reward.’ That is, the whole debt is paid, they can challenge nothing at God’s hands. God will be behindhand with none of his creatures. As they have what they looked for, so they must expect no more, they must be content with their penny. The phrase is borrowed from matters of contract between man and man, and is a word proper to those which give a discharge for a debt. As creditors and money-lenders, when they are paid home the full sum which is due to them, then they can exact no more; so here they must be contented with the empty, windy puffs of vainglory, and to feed upon the unsavoury breath of the people: they can expect no more from God, for the bond is cancelled, and they have received their full reward already. Briefly, here is the difference in the several rewards that the hypocrites and the children of God have: the hypocrites, they are all for the present, and have their reward, and much good may it do them; there is not a jot behind, it will be in vain to expect any more: but now, for the children of God, your Father will reward you; they must expect and wait for the future. And yet in scripture we read oftentimes that the children of God have their reward in this life; but then the word in the original is ἔχουσι, which signifieth they have but in part; not the word which is used here, ἀπέχουσι, which signifies they have what is due, it is fulfilled, paid them. So those expressions in scripture are to be taken: ‘Ye have eternal life,’ ‘and he hath,’ ‘and that ye may have.’ It is often spoken in scripture of the children of God, so that they seem to have their reward too. They have their reward, but it is partially, not totally: there is something, the best things, yet behind. A child of God, he hath promises, first-fruits, some beginnings of communion with God here, but he looks for greater things to come.

Well, then, Christ, having disproved the practice of the Pharisees, seeks to set his own disciples right in the management of their prayers, as well as in their alms. Pharisaism is very natural in the best. We are apt to be haunted with a carnal spirit in the best duties; not only in alms, where we have to do with men, but in prayer, where our business lieth wholly with God; especially in public prayer; even there much of man will creep in. The devil is like a fly, which, if driven from one place, pitcheth upon another; so drive him out of alms, and he will seek to taint your prayers.

Therefore Christ, to rectify his disciples in their personal and solitary prayers, instructs them to withdraw into some place of recess and retirement, and to be content with God for witness, approver, and judge. ‘But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet; and when thou hast shut thy doors, pray to thy Father which is in secret,’ &c.

In which words you may observe:—

I. A supposition concerning solitary prayer: ‘But thou, when thou prayest.’

II. A direction about it: ‘Enter into thy closet, and shut thy door, and pray to thy Father which is in secret.’

III. Encouragement to perform it: ‘And thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.’ Where two things are asserted:—

1. God’s sight: He is conscious to thy prayers when others are not.

2. God’s reward: ‘He will reward thee openly.’

To open the circumstances of the text:—

In the supposition, ‘But thou, when thou prayest,’ observe:—

1. Christ takes it for granted that his disciples will pray to God. He doth not say, if thou prayest, but when thou prayest, as supposing them to be sufficiently convinced of this duty of being often with God in private.

TO THE READER

THE following discourses on those important subjects of the temptation and transfiguration of our blessed Saviour, together with the sermons on the first chapter of the Epistle to the Colossians, from the fourteenth to the twenty-first verse, having been carefully perused, and transcribed from the reverend author’s own manuscripts, are now, at the earnest request of divers persons that were the happy auditors thereof, offered to public view. Had the author lived to publish these himself, they had come forth into the world more exact; but yet as they are now left, I doubt not but they will be very acceptable to all that have discerning minds, for the peculiar excellency contained in them.

Thus much was thought necessary to be said by way of preface, the work sufficiently commending itself, especially coming from , such an author as Dr Manton.

THE TEMPTATION OF CHRIST.

SERMON I.

Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness, to be tempted of the devil.—Mat. IV. 1.

THIS scripture giveth us the history of Christ’s temptation, which I shall go over by degrees.

In the words observe:—

1. The parties tempted and tempting. The person tempted was the Lord Jesus Christ. The person tempting was the devil.

2. The occasion inducing this combat, Jesus was led up of the Spirit.

3. The time, then.

4. The place, the wilderness.

From the whole observe:—

Doct. The Lord Jesus Christ was pleased to submit himself to an extraordinary combat with the tempter, for our good.

1. I shall explain the nature and circumstances of this extraordinary combat.

2. The reasons why Christ submitted to it.

3. The good of this to us.

I. The circumstances of this extraordinary combat. And here—

1. The persons combating—Jesus and the devil, the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. It was designed long before: Gen. iii. 15, ‘I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel;’ and now it is accomplished. Here is the Prince of Peace against the prince of darkness, Michael and the dragon, the Captain of our salvation and our grand enemy. The devil is the great architect of wickedness, as Christ is the Prince of life and righteousness. These are the combatants: the one ruined the creation of God, and the other restored and repaired it.

2. The manner of the combat. It was not merely a phantasm, that Christ was thus assaulted and used: no, he was tempted in reality, not in conceit and imagination only. It seemeth to be in the spirit, though it was real; as Paul was taken up into the third heaven, whether in the body or out of the body we cannot easily judge, but real it was. I shall more accurately discuss this question afterwards in its more proper place.

3. What moved him, or how was he brought to enter into the lists with Satan? He was ‘led by the Spirit,’ meaning thereby the impulsion and excitation of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God. For it is said, Luke iv. 1, ‘Jesus, being full of the Holy Ghost, returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.’ He did not voluntarily put himself upon temptation, but, by God’s appointment, went up from Jordan farther into the desert.

We learn hence:—

[1.] That temptations come not by chance, not out of the earth, nor merely from the devil; but God ordereth them for his own glory and our good. Satan was fain to beg leave to tempt Job: Job i. 12, ‘And the Lord said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power, only upon himself put not forth thine hand;’ there is a concession with a limitation. Till God exposeth us to trials, the devil can not trouble us, nor touch us. So Luke xxii. 31, ‘Simon, Simon, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat.’ Nay, he could not enter into the herd of swine without a patent and new pass from Christ: Mat. viii. 31, ‘So the devils besought him, saying, If thou cast us out, suffer us to go away into the herd of swine.’ This cruel spirit is held in the chains of an irresistible providence, that he cannot molest any creature of God without his permission; which is a great satisfaction to the faithful: all things which concern our trial are determined and ordered by God. If we be free, let us bless God for it, and pray that he would not ‘lead us into temptation: ‘if tempted, when we are in Satan’s hands, remember Satan is in God’s hand.

[2.] Having given up ourselves to God, we are no longer to be at our own dispose and direction, but must submit ourselves to be led, guided, and ordered by God in all things. So it was with Christ, he was led by the Spirit continually: if he retire into the desert, he is ‘led by the Spirit.’ Luke iv. 1; if he come back again into Galilee, ver. 4, ‘Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee.’ The Holy Ghost leadeth him into the conflict, and when it was ended leadeth him back again. Now there is a perfect likeness between a Christian and Christ: he is led by the Spirit off and on, so we must be guided by the same Spirit in all our actions: Rom. viii. 14, ‘For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.’

[3.] That we must observe our warrant and calling in all we resolve upon. To put ourselves upon hazards we are not called unto, is to go out of our bounds to meet a temptation, or to ride into the devil’s quarters. Christ did not go of his own accord into the desert, but by divine impulsion, and so he came from thence. We may, in our place and calling, venture ourselves, on the protection of God’s providence, upon obvious temptations; God will maintain and support us in them; that is to trust God; but to go out of our calling is to tempt God.

[4.] Compare the words used in Matthew and Mark, chap. i. 12, ‘And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness.’ That shows that it was a forcible motion, or a strong impulse, such as he could not easily resist or refuse, so here is freedom—he was led; there is force and efficacious impression—he was driven, with a voluntary condescension thereunto. There may be liberty of man’s will, yet the victorious efficacy of grace united together: a man may be taught and drawn, as Christ here was led, and driven by the Spirit into the wilderness.

3. The time.

[1.] Presently after his baptism. Now the baptism of Christ agreeth with ours as to the general nature of it. Baptism is our initiation into the service of God, or our solemn consecration of ourselves to him; and it doth not only imply work, but fight: Rom. vi. 13, ‘Neither yield ye your members as instruments, ὁπλα, of un righteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God;’ and, Rom. xiii. 12, ‘Let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.’ Christ’s baptism had the same general nature with ours, not the same special nature: the general nature is an engagement to God, the special use of baptism is to be a seal of the new covenant, or to be to us ‘the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.’ Now this Christ was not capable of, he had no sin to be repented of or remitted; but his baptism was an engagement to the same military work to which we are engaged. He came into the world for that end and purpose, to war against sin and Satan; he engageth as the general, we as the common soldiers. He as the general: 1 John iii. 8, ‘For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, ἵνα λύσῃ, that he might destroy the works of the devil.’ His baptism was the taking of the field as general; we undertake to fight under him in our rank and place.

[2.] At this baptismal engagement the Father had given him a testimony by a voice from heaven: ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased;’ and the Holy Ghost had descended upon him in the form of a dove, Mark iii. 16, 17. Now presently after this he is set upon by the tempter. Thus many times the children of God, after solemn assurances of his love, are exposed to great temptations. Of this you may see an instance in Abraham: Gen. xxii. 1, ‘And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham;’ that is, after he had assured Abraham that he was ‘his shield, and his exceeding great reward,’ and given him so many renewed testimonies of his favour. So Paul, after his rapture, ‘lest he should be exalted above measure through the abundance of revelations, there was given to him a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet him,’ 2 Cor. xii. 7. So Heb. x. 32, ‘But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of afflictions;’ i.e., after ye were fully convinced of the Christian faith, and furnished with those virtues and graces that belong to it. God’s conduct is gentle, and proportioned to our strength, as Jacob drove as the little ones were able to bear it. He never suffers his castles to be besieged till they are victualled.

[3.] Immediately before he entered upon his prophetical office. Experience of temptations fits for the ministry, as Christ’s temptations prepared him to set a-foot the kingdom of God, for the recovery of poor souls out of their bondage into the liberty of the children of God: ver. 17, ‘From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Our state of innocency was our health, the grace of the Redeemer our medicine, Christ our physician; for the devil had poisoned our human nature. Therefore, when he sets a-foot his healing cure, it was fit and congruous that he should experimentally feel the power of the tempter, and in what manner he doth assault and endanger souls: Christ also would show us that ministers should not only be men of science, but of experience.

[4.] The place or field where this combat was fought, the wilderness, where were none but wild beasts: Mark i. 13, ‘And he was there in the wilderness forty days tempted of Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him.’ Great question there is in what wilderness Christ was; their opinion is most probable who think it was the great wilderness, called the desert of Arabia, in which the Israelites wandered forty years, and in which Elijah fasted forty days and forty nights. In this solitary place Satan tried his utmost power against our Saviour.

This teacheth us:—

(1.) That Christ alone grappled with Satan, having no fellow-worker with him, that we may know the strength of our Redeemer, who is able himself to overcome the tempter without any assistance’ and to ‘save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him,’ Heb. vii. 25.

(2.) That the devil often abuseth our solitude. It is good sometimes to be alone; but then we need to be stocked with holy thoughts or employed in holy exercises, that we may be able to say, as Christ, John xvi. 32, ‘I am not alone, because the Father is with me.’ Howsoever a state of retirement from human converse, if it be not necessary, exposeth us to temptations; but if we are cast upon it, we must expect God’s presence and help.

(3.) That no place is privileged from temptations, unless we leave our hearts behind us. David, walking on the terrace or house-top, was ensnared by Bathsheba’s beauty: 2 Sam. xi. 2-4. Lot, that was chaste in Sodom, yet committed incest in the mountain, where there were none but his own family: Gen. xix. 30, 31, &c. When we are locked in our closets, we cannot shut out Satan.

II. The reasons why Christ submitted to it.

1. With respect to Adam, that the parallel between the first and second Adam might be more, exact. They are often compared in scripture, as Rom. v., latter end, and 1 Cor. xv.; and we read, Rom. v. 14, that the first Adam was τύπος τοῦ μέλλοντος, ‘the figure of him that was to come.’ And as in other respects, so in this; in the same way we were destroyed by the first Adam, in the same way we were restored by the second. Christ recovereth and winneth that which Adam lost. Our happiness was lost by the first Adam being over come by the tempter; so it must be recovered by the second Adam, the tempter being overcome by him. He that did conquer must first be conquered, that sinners might be rescued from the captivity wherein he held them captive. The first Adam, being assaulted quickly after his entrance into paradise, was overcome; and therefore must the second Adam overcome him as soon as he entered upon his office, and that in a conflict hand-to-hand, in that nature that was foiled. The devil must lose his prisoners in the same way that he caught them. Christ must do what Adam could not do. The victory is gotten by a public person in our nature, before it can be gotten by each individual in his own person, for so it was lost. Adam lost the day before he had . any offspring, so Christ winneth it in his own person before he doth solemnly begin to preach the gospel and call disciples; and therefore here was the great overthrow of the adversary.

2. In regard of Satan, who by his conquest got a twofold power over man by tempting, he got an interest in his heart to lead him ‘captive at his will’ and pleasure, 2 Tim. ii. 26; and he was made God’s executioner, he got a power to punish him: Heb. ii. 14, ‘That through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil.’ Therefore the Son of God, who interposed on our behalf, and undertook the rescue of sinners, did assume the nature of man that he might conquer Satan in the nature that was conquered, and also offer himself as a sacrifice in the same nature for the demonstration of the justice of God. First, Christ must overcome by obedience, tried to the uttermost by temptations; and then he must also overcome by suffering. By overcoming temptations, he doth overcome Satan as a tempter; and by death he overcame him as a tormentor, or as the prince of death, who had the power of executing God’s sentence. So that you see before he overcame him by merit, he overcame him by example, and was an instance of a tempted man before he was an instance of a persecuted man, or one that came to make satisfaction to God’s justice.

3. With respect to the saints, who are in their passage to heaven to be exposed to great difficulties and trials. Now that they might have comfort and hope in their Redeemer, and come to him boldly as one touched with a feeling of their infirmities, he himself submitted to be tempted. This reason is recorded by the apostle in two places: Heb. ii. 18, ‘For in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.’ Able to succour; that is, fit, powerful, inclined, effectually moved to succour them. None so merciful as those who have been once miserable; and they who have not only known misery, but felt it, do more readily relieve and succour others. God biddeth Israel to pity strangers: Exod. xxii. 21, ‘Thou shalt neither vex a stranger, nor oppress him; for ye were strangers m the land of Egypt.’ They knew what it was to be exposed to the envy and hatred of the neighbours in the land where they sojourned: Exod xxiii. 9, ‘For ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.’ We read that when King Richard the First had been, on the sea near Sicily, like to be drowned, he recalled that ancient and barbarous custom, whereby the goods of shipwrecked men were escheated to the crown, making provision that those goods should be preserved for the right owners. Christ being tossed in the tempest of temptations, knows what belongs to the trouble thereof. The other place is, Heb. iv. 15, ‘We have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.’ Christ hath experienced how strong the assailant is, how feeble our nature is, how hard a matter it is to withstand when we are so sorely assaulted. His own experience of sufferings and temptations in himself doth entender his heart, and make him fit for sympathy with us and begets a tender compassion towards the miseries and frailties of his members.

4. With respect to Christ himself, that he might be an exact pat tern of obedience to God. The obedience is little worth, which is carried on in an even tenor, when we have no temptation to the contrary but is cast off as soon as we are tempted to disobey: James i. 12 ‘Blessed is the man that endureth temptation, for when he is tried he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.’ And Heb. xi. 17, ‘By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac: and he that had received the promises offered up his only-begotten son.’ Now Christ was to be more eminent than all the holy ones of God, and therefore, that he might give an evidence of his piety, constancy, and trust in God, it was thought fit some trial should be made of him, that he might by example teach us what reason we have to hold to God against the strongest temptations.

III. The good of this to us. It teacheth us divers things, four I shall instance in.

1. To show us who is our grand enemy, the devil, who sought the misery and destruction of mankind, as Christ did our salvation And therefore he is called ὁ ἔχθρος, the enemy; Mat. xiii. 39, ‘The enemy that sowed them is the devil.’ And he is called also ὁ πονηρὸς, the wicked one, Mat. xiii. 19, as the first and deepest in evil. And’ be cause this malicious cruel spirit ruined mankind at first, he is called ‘a liar and murderer from the beginning.’ John viii. 44. A liar because of his deceit; a murderer, to show us what he hath done and would do. It was he that set upon Christ, and doth upon us as at first to destroy our health, so still to keep us from our medicine and recovery out of the lapsed estate by the gospel of Christ.

2. That all men, none excepted, are subject to temptations. If any might plead for exemption, our Lord Jesus, the eternal Son of God might; but he was assaulted and tempted; and if the devil tempted our Saviour, he will be much more bold with us. The godly are yet in the way not at the end of the journey; in the field, not with the crown on their heads; and it is God’s will that the enemy should have leave to assault them. None go to heaven without a trial: ‘All these things are accomplished in your brethren that are in the flesh.’ 1 Pet. v. 9. To look for an exempt privilege, or immunity from temptation, is to list ourselves as Christ’s soldiers, and never expect battle or conflict.

3. It showeth us the manner of conflict, both of Satan’s fight and our Saviour’s defence.

[1,] Of Satan’s fight. It is some advantage not to be ignorant of his enterprises: 2 Cor. ii. 11, ‘Lest Satan should get an advantage of us, for we are not ignorant of his devices.’ Then we may the better stand upon our guard. He assaulted Christ by the same kind of temptations by which usually he assaults us. The kinds of temptations are reckoned up: 1 John ii. 16, ‘The lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eye, and the pride of life.’ And James iii. 15, ‘This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish.’ With these temptations he assaulted our first parents: Gen. iii. 8, ‘When the woman saw that the tree was good for fruit, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat.’ And with the same temptations he assaulted Christ, tempting him to turn stones into bread, to satisfy the longings of the flesh; to fall down and worship him, as to the sight of a bewitching object to his eyes; to fly in the air in pride, and to get glory among men. Here are our snares, which we must carefully avoid.

[2.] The manner of Christ’s defence, and so it instructeth us how to overcome and carry ourselves in temptations. And here are two things whereby we evercome:—

(1.) By scripture. The word of God is ‘the sword of the Spirit,’ Eph. vi. 17, and 1 John ii. 14, ‘The word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one.’ It is good to have the word of God abide in our memories, but chiefly in our hearts, by a sound belief and fervent love to the truth.

(2.) Partly by resolution: 1 Pet. iv. 1, ‘Arm yourselves with the same mind,’ viz., that was in Christ. When Satan grew bold and troublesome, Christ rejects him with indignation. Now the conscience of our duty should thus prevail with us to be resolute therein; the double-minded are as it were torn in pieces between God and the devil: James i. 8, ‘A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.’ Therefore, being in God’s way, we should resolve to be deaf to all temptations.

4. The hopes of success. God would set Christ before us as a pattern of trust and confidence, that when we address ourselves to serve God, we might not fear the temptations of Satan. We have an example of overcoming the devil in our glorious head and chief. If he pleaded, John xvi. 33, ‘In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world;’ the same holdeth good here, for the enemies of our salvation are combined. He overcame the devil in our natures, that we might not be discouraged: we fight against the same adversaries in the same cause, and he will give power to us, his weak members, being full of compassion, which certainly is a great comfort to us.

Use. Of instruction to us:—

1. To reckon upon temptations. As soon as we mind our baptismal covenant, we must expect that Satan will be our professed foe, seeking to terrify or allure us from the banner of our captain, Jesus Christ. Many, after baptism, fly to Satan’s camp. There are a sort of men in the visible church, who, though they do not deny their baptism, as those did, 2 Pet. ii. 9, ‘Who have forgotten that they were purged from their old sins,’ yet they carry themselves as if they were in league with the devil, the world, and the flesh, rather than with the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; with might and main they oppose Christ’s kingdom, both abroad and at home, in their own hearts, and are wholly governed by worldly things, the lusts of the flesh, and the lusts of the eye, and the pride of life. Now these are the devil’s agents, and the more dangerous because they use Christ’s name against his offices, and the form of his religion to destroy the power thereof; as the dragon in the Revelation, pushed with the horns of the Lamb. Others are not venomously and malignantly set against Christ, and his interest in the world, or in their own hearts, but tamely yield to the lusts of the flesh, and go ‘like an ox to the slaughter, and a fool to the correction of the stocks.’ Prov. vii. 22. We cannot say that Satan’s work lieth about these. Satan needeth not besiege the soul by temptations; that is his already by peaceable possession; ‘when a strong man armed keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace.’ Luke xi. 21. There is no storm when wind and tide goeth together. But then there is a third sort of men, that begin to be serious, and to mind their recovery by Christ: they have many good motions and convictions of the danger of sin, excellency of Christ, necessity of holiness; they have many purposes to leave sin and enter upon a holy course of life, but ‘the wicked one cometh, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart.’ Mat. xiii. 19. He beginneth betimes to oppose the work, before we are confirmed and settled in a course of godliness, as he did set upon Christ presently upon his baptism. Baptism in us implieth avowed dying unto sin and living unto God; now God permitteth temptation to try our resolution. There is a fourth sort, of such as have made some progress in religion, even to a degree of eminency: these are not altogether free; for if the devil had confidence to assault the declared Son of God, will he be afraid of a mere mortal man? No; these he assaulteth many times very sorely: pirates venture on the greatest booty. These he seeketh to draw off from Christ, as Pharaoh sought to bring back the Israelites after their escape; or to foil them by some scandalous fall, to do religion a mischief: 2 Sam. xii. 14, ‘By this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme;’ or at least to vex them and torment them, to make the service of God tedious and uncomfortable to them: Luke xxii. 31, ‘Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he might sift you as wheat’—to toss and vex you, as wheat in a sieve. So that no sort of Christians can promise them selves exemption; and God permitteth it, because to whom much is given, of them the more is required.

2. The manner and way of his fight is by the world, per blanda et aspera, by the good or evil things of the world. There is ‘armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left.’ 2 Cor. vi. 7, as there are right-hand and left-hand temptations. Both ways he lieth in ambush in the creature. Sometimes he tempts us by the good things of the world: 1 Chron. xxi. 1, ‘And Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel.’ so glorying in his might, and puissance, and victory over neighbour kings. So meaner people he tempteth to abuse their wealth to pride and luxury; therefore we are pressed to be sober: 1 Pet. v. 8, ‘Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.’ The devil maketh an advantage of our prosperity, to divert us from God and heaven, and to render us unapt for the strictness of our holy calling. Sometimes he tempts us by the evil things of this world: Job i. 11, ‘Put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face.’ Satan’s aim in bringing the saints into trouble is to draw them to fretting, murmuring, despondency, and distrust of providence, yea, to open defection from God, or blasphemy against him; and therefore it is said, 1 Pet. v. 9, ‘Knowing that the same afflictions,’ &c., because temptations are conveyed to us by our afflictions or troubles in the flesh.

3. His end is to dissuade us from good, and persuade us to evil. To dissuade us from good by representing the impossibility, trouble, and small necessity of it. If men begin to apply themselves to a strict course, such as they have sworn to in baptism, either it is so hard as not to be borne, as John vi. 60, ‘This is a hard saying, who can bear it?’ Whereas, Mat. xix. 29, ‘Every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, &c., for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.’ Or the troubles which accompany a strict profession are many. The world will note us: John xii. 42, ‘Nevertheless, among the chief rulers also many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees, they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue.’ Whereas we must not be ashamed of Christ: 2 Tim. ii. 12, ‘If we suffer, we shall also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us.’ Or that we need not be so strict and nice, whereas all we can do is little enough: Mark xxv. 9, ‘Not so, lest there be not enough for us and you.’ In general, the greatest mischiefs done us by sin are not regarded, but the least inconvenience that attendeth our duty is urged and aggravated. He persuadeth us to evil by profit, pleasure, necessity; we cannot live without it in the world. He hideth the hook, and showeth the bait only; he concealeth the hell, the horror, the eternal pains that follow sin, and only telleth you how beneficial, profitable, and delightful the sin will be to you: Prov. ix. 17, 18, ‘Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. But he knoweth not that the dead are there, and that her guests are in the depths of hell.’

4. While we are striving against temptations, let us remember our general. We do but follow the Captain of our salvation, who hath vanquished the enemy, and will give us the victory if we keep striving: ‘The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly,’ Rom. xvi. 2. Not his feet, but ours: we shall be conquerors. Our enemy is vigilant and strong: it is enough for us that our Redeemer is merciful and faithful in succouring the tempted, and able to master the tempter, and defeat all his methods. Christ hath conquered him, both as a lamb and as a lion: Rev. v. 5, 8. The notion of a lamb intimateth his sacrifice, the notion of a lion his victory: in the lamb is merit, in the lion strength; by the one he maketh satisfaction to God, by the other he rescueth sinners out of the paw of the roaring lion, and maintaineth his interest in their hearts. Therefore let us not be discouraged, but closely adhere to him.

SERMON II.

And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterwards an hungered. And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. And he answered and said, It is written, Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.—Mat. IV. 2-4.

IN these words there are three branches:—

First, The occasion.

Secondly, The temptation itself.

Thirdly, Christ’s answer.

First, The occasion of the first temptation, in the second verse, ‘When he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterwards an hungered.’ Where take notice:—

I. Of his fasting.

II. Of his hunger.

And something I shall speak of them conjunctly, something distinctly and apart.

1. Conjunctly. In every part of our Lord’s humiliation, there is an emission of some beams of his Godhead, that whenever he is seen to be true man, he might be known to be true God also. Is Christ hungry? There was a fast of forty days’ continuance preceding, to show how, as God, he could sustain his human nature. The verity of his human nature is seen, because he submitted to all our sinless infirmities. The power of his divine nature was manifested, because it enabled him to continue forty days and nights without eating or drinking anything, the utmost that an ordinary man can fast being but nine days usually. Thus his divinity and humanity are expressed in most or all of his actions: John i. 14, ‘The word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, as the glory of the only-begotten Son of God.’ There was a veil of flesh, yet the glory of his divine nature was seen, and might be seen, by all that had an eye and heart to see it. He lay in the manger at Bethlehem, but a star appeared to conduct the wise men to him; and angels proclaimed his birth to the shepherds: Luke ii. 13, 14. He grew up from a child, at the ordinary rate of other children; but when he was but twelve years old, he disputed with the doctors: Luke ii. 42. He submitted to baptism, but then owned by a voice from heaven to be God’s beloved Son. He was deceived in the fig-tree when an hungered, which shows the infirmity of human ignorance; but suddenly blasted, this manifested the glory of a divine power: Mat. xxi. 19. Here tempted by Satan, but ministered unto and attended upon by a multitude of glorious angels: Mat. iv. 11; finally crucified through weakness, but living by the power of God: 2 Cor. xiii. 4. He hung dying on the cross; but then the rocks were rent, the graves opened, and the sun darkened. All along you may have these intermixtures. He needed to humble himself to purchase our mercies; but withal to give a discovery of a divine glory to assure our faith. Therefore, when there were any evidences of human frailty, lest the world should be offended, and stumble thereat, he was pleased at the same time to give some notable demonstration of the divine power; as, on the other side, when holy men are honoured by God, something falleth out to humble them: 2 Cor. xii. 7.

2. Distinctly and apart. Where observe:—

[1.] That he fasted forty days and forty nights; so did Moses when he received the law: Exod. xxxiv. 28; and at the restoring of the law Elias did the like: 1 Kings xix. 8. Now what these two great prophets had done, Christ, the great prophet and doctor of the Christian church, did also. For the number of forty days, curiosity may make itself work enough; but it is dangerous to make conclusions where no certainty appeareth. However this is not amiss, that forty days were the usual time allotted for repentance: as to the Ninevites, Jonah iii. 4; so the prophet Ezekiel was to bear the sins of the people for forty days; and the flood was forty days in coming on the old world: Gen. vii. 17. This was the time given for their repentance, and therefore for their humiliation; yet the forty days’ fast in Lent is ill-grounded on this example, for this fast of Christ cannot be imitated by us, more than other his miracles.

[2.] At the end of the forty days he was an hungered, sorely assaulted with faintness and hunger, as any other man at any time is for want of meat. God’s providence permitted it, that he might be more capable of Satan’s temptations; for Satan fits his temptations to men’s present case and condition. When Christ was hungry, he tempteth him to provide bread, in such a way as the tempter doth prescribe. He worketh upon what he findeth: when men are full, he tempteth them to be proud, and forget God; when they are destitute, to distrust God: if he sees men covetous, he fits them with a wedge of gold, as he did Achan; if discontented, and plotting the destruction of another, he findeth out occasions. When Judas had a mind to sell his Master, he presently sendeth him a chapman. Thus he doth work upon our dispositions, or our condition; most upon our dispositions, but here only upon Christ’s condition. He observeth which way the tree leaneth, and then thrusteth it forward.

Secondly, The temptation itself, verse the third. Where two things are observable:—

I. The intimation of his address, ‘And when the tempter came to him.’

II. The proposal of the temptation, ‘If thou be the Son of God,’ &c.

I. For the address to the temptation, ‘And when the tempter came to him.’ there two things must be explained:—

1. In what manner the tempter came to Christ.

2. How he is said to come then to him.

[1.] How he came to him. Whether the temptations of Christ are to be understood by way of vision, or historically, as things visibly acted and done? This latter I incline unto; and I handle here, because it is said, προσελθὼν αὐτῷ ὁ πειράζων,—‘The tempter came to him.’ This importeth some local motion and accession of the tempter to Christ, under a visible and external form and shape. As afterwards, when the Lord biddeth him be gone, ‘then the devil leaveth him,’ ver. 11; a retiring of Satan out of his presence, not the ceasing of a vision only. Yea, all along, he ‘taketh him,’ and ‘sets him on a pinnacle of the temple,’ and ‘taketh him to an high mountain.’ All which show some external appearance of Satan, and not a word that intimateth a vision. Neither can it be conceived how any act of adoration could be demanded by Satan of Christ ‘fall down and worship me ‘unless the object to be worshipped were set before him in some visible shape. The coming of the angels to Christ when the devil left him, ver. 11, all understand historically, and of some external coming. Why is not the coming and going of the devil thus to be understood also? And if all had been done in vision, and not by converse, how could Christ be an hungered, or the devil take that occasion to tempt him? How could answers and replies be tossed to and fro, and scriptures alleged? So that from the whole view of the frame of the text, here was some external congress between Christ and the devil. If you think it below Christ, you forget the wonderful condescension of the Son of God; it is no more unworthy of him than crucifixion, passion, and burial was. It is true, in the writing of the prophets, many things historically related were only done in vision; but not in the Gospels, which are an history of the life and death of Christ; where things are plainly set down as they were done. To men the grievousness of Christ’s temptations would be much lessened, if we should think it only a piece of fantasy, and imaginary rather than real. And if his temptations be lessened, so will his victory, so will our comfort. In short, such as was Christ’s journey into the wilderness, such was his fast, such his temptation; all real. For all are delivered to us in the same style and thread of discourse. Yea, further, if these things had been only in vision and ecstacy, there would have been no danger to Christ in the second temptation, when he was tempted to throw himself down from the pinnacle of the temple. Surely then he was truly tempted, and not in vision only; yea, it seemeth not so credible and agreeable to the dignity and holiness of Christ, that Satan should tempt by internal false suggestions, and the immission of species into his fancy or understanding; that Christ should seem to be here and there, when all the while he was in the desert. For either Christ took notice of these false images in his fancy, or not. If not, there is no temptation; if so, there will be an error in the mind of Christ, that he should think himself to be on the pinnacle of the temple, or top of an high mountain, when he was in the desert. It is hard to think these suggestions could be made without some error or sin; but an external suggestion maketh the sin to be in the tempter only, not in the person tempted. Our first parents lost not their innocency by the external suggestion, but internal admission of it, dwelling upon it in their minds. To a man void of sin, the tempter hath no way of tempting but externally.

[2.] How is this access to Christ said to be after his fasting, when, in Luke iv. 2, it is said, ‘Being forty days tempted of the devil, and in those days he did eat nothing; and when they were ended, he afterward hungered’?

SERMON III.

Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, and saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee; and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.—Mat. IV. 5, 6.

IN this second temptation I shall give you—(1.) The history of it; (2.) Observations upon it.

I. The history of it. There,

1. What Satan did.

2. What he said.

3. The soreness of the temptation.

1. What he did: ‘Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple.’ There—(1.) Take notice of the ground which the devil chose for the conflict: ‘He taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on the pinnacle of the temple.’ By the holy city is meant Jerusalem, for this name is given to it in other scriptures: Isa. lviii. 2, ‘They call themselves of the holy city.’ And Isa. lii. 1, ‘O Jerusalem, the holy city;’ and in many other places. It was so called, because it was the seat of God’s worship, and the place where God manifested his gracious presence with his people. If you ask why now it was called the holy city, since it was a city of blood, the seat of all wickedness, in which the law of God was depraved, their religion corrupted, their religion polluted? I answer, Yet there was the temple of the Lord. Some relics of good and holy men, some grace yet continued, and the only place that owned the true God, though with much corruption. The more especial place which the devil chose for the conflict was πτερύγιον τοῦ ἱεροῦ, ‘the pinnacle of the temple,’ or ‘the wing of the temple;’ meaning the border round about the flat covering of the temple to hinder any one from falling off easily, which might be adorned with pinnacles and spires, from whence one might easily fall. (2.) How the devil got him there? Whether Christ was carried through the air, or went on his feet, following him of his own accord? The last seemeth to be countenanced by Luke; that he led him to the pinnacle of the temple, Luke iv. 9, ἤγαγεν αὐτὸν; yet the former is preferred by most ancient and modern interpreters, and not without reason. For Christ voluntarily to follow the devil, and to go up to the top of the temple, and stand on one of the pinnacles thereof, it seemeth improbable, and would take up more time than could be spent on this temptation. He that would not obey the devil persuading him to cast himself down, that he might not tempt God, would not voluntarily have gone up with him, for that would have been the beginning of a temptation, to yield so far. Most probably, then, Satan was permitted to carry him in the air, without doing him any hurt, to Jerusalem, and one of the pinnacles of the temple and battlements thereof. But how Christ was carried in the air, visibly or invisibly, the scripture showeth not: it affirmeth the thing, but sets not down the manner. We must believe what it asserteth, reverence what it concealeth. Here was a real translation, a transportation from place to place, not imaginary, for then Christ had been in no danger. And again, not violent, but voluntary—a carrying, not a haling—a leading, not a forcing, as the wrestler is drawn on to the combat. As he suffered himself to be drawn to death by Satan’s instruments, so by the devil to be translated from place to place. The officers of the high priest had power to carry him from the garden to Annas, from Annas to Caiaphas, from Caiaphas to Pilate, from Pilate to Herod, from Herod to Pilate again, and then from Gabbatha to Golgotha, which could not have been unless this power had been given them from above, as Christ himself telleth Pilate, John xix. 11. So God, for his greater glory and our instruction, permitted this transportation; therefore this translation is not to be imputed to the weakness of Christ, but his patience, submitting thus far that he might experience all the machinations of Satan; and the transporting is not to be ascribed to the tempter’s strength, but his boldness. Christ did not obey him, but submitted to the divine dispensation, and would fight with him not only in the desert, but in the holy city: and no wonder if Christ suffered Satan to carry him, who suffered his instruments to crucify him.

2. What he said to him, ver. 6, where take notice—(1.) Of the temptation itself, ‘If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down.’ (2.) The reason alleged to back it, ‘For it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee,’ &c.

[1.] The temptation itself: ‘If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down.’ Mark what was the mote in the devil’s eye, that Christ was declared to be the Son of God, the Messiah and Saviour of the world. He would have him to put it to this proof in the sight of all Jerusalem, wherein, if he failed, and had died of the fall, the Jews would think him an impostor; if he had escaped, he had submitted to the devil’s methods, and so had run into the former sins mentioned before in the first temptation, his doing something at the devil’s direction; his disbelief of the divine oracle, unless manifested by such proof as Satan required; and besides a tempting of divine providence—the ordinary way was down stairs. He would have him leap, and throw himself over the battlements. It would be too long to go down stairs; he will teach him a nearer way: to cast himself down and fear no hurt, for if he were the Son of God he might securely do so. But chiefly Christ was not to begin his ministry by miracles, but doctrine—not from a demonstration of his power, but wisdom. The gospel was to be first preached, then sealed and confirmed by miracles; and Christ’s miracles were not to be ludicrous, but profitable—not fitted for pomp, but use—to instruct and help men, rather than strike them with wonder. Now this would discredit the gospel, if Christ should fly in the air; besides, we must not fly to extraordinary means, where ordinary are present.

Only, before I go off, observe that Satan did not offer to cast him down; that God did not suffer him to do, because he sought to bring Christ to sin. If Satan had cast him down, Christ had not sinned.

[2.J The reason by which he backeth the temptation. It is taken from scripture: ‘For it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee.’ The scripture is in Ps. xci. 11, 12, where the words run thus: ‘He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.’ Where,

First, Observe the devil’s cunning in citing scripture. The apostle telleth us that Satan is sometimes transformed into an angel of light, 2 Cor. xi. 14. And we read that once he took the habit and guise of a prophet, 1 Sam. xxviii. 18; and indeed he deceiveth more by the voice of Samuel than by the voice of the dragon. We read of τὰ βαθη τοῦ Σατανᾶ, ‘The depths of Satan,’ Rev. ii. 24. Here he cometh like a divine, with a Bible in his hand, and turneth to the place; here the enemy of God cometh with the word of God, and disguiseth the worst of actions with the best of words, opposeth God to God, and turneth his truth to countenance a lie. Being refuted by scripture, he will bring scripture too, and pretendeth to reverence that which he chiefly hateth. Christians, you have not to do with, a foolish devil, who will appear in his own colours and ugly shape, but with a devout devil, who, for his own turn, can pretend to be godly.

Secondly, That he citeth such a scripture, which exceedingly conduceth to commend the happiness of the godly; for God will not only be the keeper and guardian of them that fear him, but hath also appointed the ministry of angels; and the argument of the tempter seemeth to be taken from the less to the greater; for if it be true of every one that trusts in God, and dwelleth in the shadow of the Almighty, that God will have such a care of him, much more will he have a care of his beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased. Therefore, you that are declared to be so from heaven, and having such an occasion to show yourself to be the Son of God with so much honour and profit, why should you scruple to cast yourself down?

But wherein was the devil faulty in citing the scripture? Some say in leaving out those words, in all thy ways. This was Bernard’s gloss—in viis, non in praecipitiis: will keep you in your ways or duties, not in your headlong actions; these were none of his ways, to throw himself down from the battlements of the temple. This is not to be altogether rejected, because it reaches the sense; yet this omission was not the devil’s fault in citing this scripture; for, all thy ways signifieth no more but in all thy actions and businesses, and that is sufficiently implied in the words cited by Satan. But the devil’s error was in application. He applieth the word of God, not to instruct, but deceive; rather to breed a contempt, disdain, and hatred of scriptures, than a reverent esteem of them; to make the word of God seem uncertain; or if a reverence of them, to turn this reverence into an occasion of deceit; more particularly to tempt God to a need less proof of his power. We are not to cast ourselves into danger, that providence may fetch us off. God will protect us in the evils we suffer, not in the evils we commit—not in dangers we seek, but such as befall us besides our intention.

3. The soreness of this temptation, which appeareth in several things.

[1.] The change of place. For a new temptation, he maketh choice of a new place; he could do no good on him in the wilderness, therefore he taketh him and carrieth him into the holy city. Here was a public place where Christ might discover himself with profit, and the edification of many, if he would but submit to the devil’s methods. In the temple the Messiah was as in his own house, where it was fit the Messiah should exhibit himself to his people. There was an old prophecy, Mal. iii. 1, ‘The Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come into his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in.’ And he was to send forth his rod out of Zion, even the law of his kingdom: Ps. cx. 2. If he would yield to this advice and vain glorious ostentation of his power before that numerous multitude which continually resorted to the holy things performed in the temple, how soon should he be manifested to be the Son of God, or the power of the great God. The devil doth not persuade him to cast himself from a rock or top of a tree in the desert—that had been temerity and rashness—but from a pinnacle of the temple, an holy place, and a place of much resort. But the Son of God was not to be discovered to the world by the devil’s methods. That had been such a piece of ostentation and vainglory as did not become the Son of God, who came to teach the world humility. But, however, the temptation is grievous: in so good a design, in such an holy place, there could no ill happen to the Son of God, nor a better occasion be offered of showing himself to many, so to confirm the Jews in the truth of the oracle they had of late heard from heaven.

[2.] The change of temptations. Since he will trust, the devil will put him upon trusting; he shall trust as much as he will. There he tempted him to the use of unlawful means to preserve his life, here to the neglect of things lawful. There, that God would fail him if he were still obedient to the Spirit, and did not take another course than divine providence had as yet offered to him; here, that God would not forsake him, though he threw himself into danger. There, that he would fail though he had promised; here, that he would help though he had not promised. That faith which sustained him in his hunger would preserve him in this precipice; if he expected his preservation from God, why not now? He had hitherto tempted him to diffidence, now to prefidence, or an over-confident presumption that God would needlessly show his power. It is usual with the tempter to tempt man on both sides; sometimes to weaken his faith, at other times to neglect his duty. He was east out of heaven himself, and he is all for casting down.

[3.] The temptation was the more strong, being veiled under a pretence of scripture, and so Christ’s weapons seem to be beaten back upon himself. The devil tempted him to nothing but what he might be confident to do upon the promise of God. Now it is grievous to God’s children, when the rule of their lives and the charter of their hopes is abused to countenance a temptation.

II. The observations.

1. Observe, that the first temptation being rejected by Christ, Satan maketh a new assault. Though he get the foil, he will set on us again; like a troublesome fly that is often beaten off, yet will return to the same place. Thus the devil, when he could do no good upon his first patent against Job’s goods and children, cometh and sueth for a new commission, that he might touch his flesh and bones: Job ii. 4, 5, ‘Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life. But put forth thine hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse thee to thy face.’ Satan is incessant in his attempts against the saints, and is ready to assault afresh upon every occasion. Now this cometh to pass by Satan’s unwearied malice, who is a sworn enemy to our peace and welfare—he still ‘seeketh to devour’ us, 1 Peter v. 8; also from God’s providence, who permitteth this that we may not be careless and secure after temptation, though we have gotten the victory; for our life is a continual warfare: Job vii. 1, ‘Is there not an appointed time for man upon earth?’ The same word signifieth also a warfare. Man’s life is a perpetual toil, and a condition of manifold temptations and hazards, such as a soldier is exposed to; therefore we must perpetually watch. We get not an absolute victory till death. Now this should the more prevail with us, because many of God’s people have failed after some eminent service performed for God. Josiah, after he had prepared the temple, fell into that rash attempt against Pharaoh Necho which cost him his life: 2 Chron. xxxv. 20, ‘After all this, when Josiah had prepared the temple, Necho, king of Egypt, came up to fight against Carchemish by Euphrates; and Josiah went out against him.’ And Peter, after he had made a glorious confession, giveth his Master carnal counsel: Mat. xvi. 18, ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I build my church.’ &c.; and yet, ver. 23, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan.’ Many, after they have been much lifted up in consolation, do readily miscarry. First, he made a glorious confession, a sign of great faith; then carnal wisdom vents itself in some counsel concerning the ease of the flesh. Oh, what need have we to stand upon our guard, till God tread Satan under our feet! As one of the Roman generals, whether conquering or conquered, semper instaurat pugnam, so doth Satan.

2. Observe, God may give Satan some power over the body of one whom he loveth dearly. For Satan is permitted to transport Christ’s body from the wilderness to the holy city, and to set it on a pinnacle of the temple. As it is very consistent with God’s love to his people to suffer them to be tempted in their souls by the fiery darts of Satan, so he may permit Satan to afflict their bodies, either by himself, or by witches, who are his instruments. Thus he permitted Satan to afflict Job, chap. ii. 6, 7, ‘And the Lord said unto Satan, Behold, he is in thy hand, but save his life. So went Satan forth from the presence of the Lord, and smote Job with sore boils, from the sole of his foot unto his crown.’ The devil may have a threefold power over the bodies of men:—

[1.] By transportations, or carrying them from one place to another, which usually is not found but in those that give up themselves to his diabolical enchantments. Or,

[2.] In possessions, which were frequent and rife in Christ’s time: ‘My daughter is sorely vexed with a devil.’ Mat. xv. 22. Or,

[3.] In diseases, which is more common. Thus he afflicted Job’s body cleaveth fast unto him.’ It is דְּבַר־בְּלִיַּעַל ‘a thing of Belial.’ as if it were a pestilential disease from the devil. So some understand that, Ps. xci. 3, ‘Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.’ As if those sudden darts of venom by which we are stricken in the plague came from Satan. Certainly evil angels may have a great hand in our diseases: Ps. lxxviii. 49, ‘He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, and indignation, and trouble, by sending evil angels among them.’ But I press it not much. Only,

(1.) A word of patience, that we would submit to God, though our trials be never so sharp. We must yield to that measure of humiliation which it shall please God to prescribe. If he should give leave to Satan to inflame our blood and trouble the humours of our body, we must not repine; the Son of God permitted his sacred body to be transported by the devil in the air.

(2.) A word of comfort. Whatever power God permitteth Satan to have over our bodies, or bodily interests, yet it is limited; he cannot hurt or molest any further than God pleaseth. He had power to set Christ on a pinnacle of the temple, but not to cast him down. He had a power to touch Job’s skin, but a charge not to endanger his life: Job ii. 6, ‘Behold, he is in thine hand, but save his life.’ God sets bounds and limits to the malice of Satan, that he is not able to compass all his designs. Job was to be exercised, but God would not have him die in a cloud, his life was to be secured till better times.

(3.) A word of caution. Let not the devil make an advantage of those troubles which he bringeth upon our bodies, or the interests of the bodily life, yet let him not thereby draw you to sin. Here the devil may set Christ upon a precipice, but he can do him no further hurt; he may persuade us to cast down ourselves, but he cannot cast us down unless we cast down ourselves, Nemo laeditur nisi a seipso. His main spite is at your souls, to involve you in sin. God may give him and his instruments a power over your bodily lives, but he doth not give him a power over the graces of the saints. The devil aimeth at the destruction of souls; he can let men enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, that he may deprive you of delight in God and celestial pleasures; he can be content that you shall have dignities and honours if they prove a snare to you. If the devil seek to bring you to poverty, trouble, and nakedness, it is to draw you from God. He careth not for the body but as it may be an occasion to ruin the soul.

3. Observe, If Satan lead us up, it is to throw us down. He taketh up Christ to the pinnacle of the temple, and saith unto him, ‘Cast thyself down.’ He bringeth up many by little and little to some high place, that by their aspiring they may at length break their necks. Thus he did Haman, and so he doth many others, whose climbing maketh way for their greater fall. The devil himself was an aspirer, and fell from heaven like lightning: Luke x. 18, ‘I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.’ And though in show he may seem to befriend many that hearken to his temptations, yet in the end he crieth, ‘Down with them, down with them, even to the ground.’ God’s manner is quite contrary; when he meaneth to exalt a man, he will first humble him, and make him low: Mat. xxiii. 12, ‘Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.’ But the devil’s way is to lift them up to the clouds, that he may bring them down to the lowest pit of destruction. Adam, in conceit, must be like God, that indeed he may be like the beasts that perish: Ps. xlix. 20, ‘Man that is in honour, and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish.’

4. Observe, ‘If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down.’ The temptation is quite contrary to what it was before. Then it was to preserve life by unlawful means, now to endanger life by the neglect of means lawful; there to distrust God’s care of our preservation when he hath set us about any task or work, here to presume on his care without warrant. The devil tempts us sometimes to pamper the flesh, sometimes to neglect it in such a way as is destructive to our service. Thus the devil hurrieth us from one extreme to another, as the possessed man ‘fell oft-times into the fire, and oft into the water.’ Mat. xvii. 15. Those that are guided by Satan reel from one extremity to another; either men slight sin and make light of it, or sinners are apt to sorrow above measure, as the incestuous Corinthian: 2 Cor. ii. 17, ‘Lest perhaps such an one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow.’ And the apostle showeth there that these were the enterprises of Satan. Some men are careless of God’s interest in the world, or else heated into the activity of a bitter zeal. Some are of a scrupulous spirit, that they may make conscience of all things; and the devil hurrieth them into a large atheistical spirit, that they make conscience of nothing. How often have we known a fond scrupulosity to end in a profane licentiousness, when they have been wearied out of that kind of frame of spirit! Some are dead and heartless, like Gallio,—‘care for none of these things;’ fight Christ, fight Antichrist, it is all one to them; and usually they are such as formerly have been heated with a blind and bold madness: as Peter at first refused to have his feet washed by Christ, and then would have head, hands, feet and all washed, John xiii. 8, 9, being out in both. What sad work is there made in the church of God by Solifidians and Nullifidians: heretofore it was all faith and free grace misapplied and misunderstood; and now it’ is all morality and virtue, while Christ is neglected, and the mystery of the gospel little set by or valued. It is ever the devil’s policy to work upon the humour of people. If they will reform the church, it shall be to a degree of separation, and condemning all churches and Christians that are not of their mode; if they be for uniting, Christ’s unquestionable interests must be trodden underfoot, and all care of truth and reformation must be laid aside. If he can destroy religion and godliness no other way, he will be religious and godly himself; but it is either, as to private Christians, to set them upon overdoing, that he may make them weary of the service of Christ; or, as to the public, by crying up some unnecessary things, which Christ never commanded. If men be troubled with sin, and see a necessity of the gospel, and prize the comforts of it, the gospel must be over-gospelled, or else it will not serve their turns; and that over-gospel must be carried to such a length as to destroy the very gospel, and free grace itself. The devil first tempted the world to despise the poor fishermen that preached the gospel; but the world, being convinced by the power of the Holy Ghost, and gained to the faith, then he fought by riches and grandeur to debase the gospel; so that he hath got as much or more by the worldly glory he puts upon Christ’s messengers as by persecution. Then, when that is discovered, the devil will turn reformer; and what reformation is that? the very necessary support and maintenance of ministers must be taken away. All overdoing in God’s work is undoing. If Christ will trust, the devil will persuade him to trust, even to the degree of tempting God.

5. Observe, That the devil himself may pretend scripture to put a varnish upon his evil designs; for here he seeketh to foil Christ with his own weapons: which serveth to prevent a double extreme.

[1.] One is, not to be frighted with the mere noise and sound of scriptures, which men bring to countenance their errors. See whether they be not wrested and misapplied; for the devil may quote scripture, but he perverts the meaning of it. And usually it is so by his instruments; as that pope, who would prove a double power to be in himself, temporal and spiritual, by that scripture, Ecce duo gladii! ‘Behold, here are two swords!’ Luke xxii. 38. It is easy to rehearse the words of scripture, and therefore not the bare words, but the meaning must be regarded.

[2.] The other extreme is this: Let none vilify the scriptures, because pleaded by Satan; for so he might as well vilify human reason, which is pleaded for all the errors in the world; or law, because it is urged sometimes to justify a bad cause. For it is not scripture, that is not a nose of wax, as Papists say. It is a great proof of the authority and honour of scriptures, that Satan and his greatest instruments do place their greatest hopes of prevailing by perverting and misapplying of it.

6. Observe, That God hath given his angels a special charge about his people, to keep them, from harm. Here I shall show:—

[1.] That it is so.

[2.] Why it is so.

First, That it is so is evident by the scripture, which everywhere shows us that angels are the first instruments of his providence, which he maketh use of in guarding his faithful servants: Heb. i. 14. The apostle saith, ‘Are they not all, λειτουργικὰ πνεύματα, ministering spirits, sent forth to minister to them that shall be the heirs of salvation?’ Their work and employment is to attend us at God’s direction, not to be worshipped and served by us by any devotion. They are ‘ministering spirits.’ not ours, but Christ’s; he that serveth hath a master whom he serveth, and by whom he is sent forth: their work and employment is to attend us indeed, but at the command and direction of their own Master. They are not at our beck to go and come at our pleasure, neither do they go and come at their inclination, but at the commission of God: their work is appointed by him, they serve us as their Master’s children, at his command and will; and whom do they serve? ‘The heirs of salvation.’ They are described, Titus iii. 7, ‘That being justified by grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.’ They are not ministers of conversion and sanctification: to this ministry Christ hath called men, not angels; but in preserving the converted the angels have a hand. Therefore it is notable they are sometimes called God’s angels: Ps. ciii. 21, ‘Bless the Lord, all ye his hosts, ye ministers of his that do his pleasure;’ sometimes their angels: Mat. xviii. 10, ‘Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones, for I say unto you, that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.’

But whether every one hath an angel-guardian is a curious question. Sometimes one angel serveth many persons: Ps. xxxiv. 7, ‘The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivered) them;’ and sometimes many angels are about one person: 2 Kings vi. 17, ‘And, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots round about Elisha.’ And here in the text quoted by Satan, ‘He shall give his angels charge concerning thee.’ There is not mention made of one, but many angels, and the angels in general are said to be ministering spirits. When soldiers are said to watch for a city, it is not meant that every citizen hath a soldier to watch for him.

The only place which seemeth to countenance that opinion is Acts xii. 15, ‘Then said they, It is his angel.’ But if Peter had a peculiar angel to guard him, and look after him then, when he was in great trouble, and detained in prison, it doth not follow that every person and everywhere should have an angel-guardian. Besides, an assertion in scripture must be distinguished from men introduced speaking in scripture. It showeth, indeed, that it was the opinion of the Jews at that time, which these holy men had imbibed and drunk in. Or it may be the word angel is only taken for a messenger sent from Peter. Why should an angel stand knocking at the door, who could easily make his entrance? And is it credible that the guardian angels do take their shape and habit whose angels they are? It is enough for us to believe that all the angels are our guardians, who are sent to keep us and preserve us, as it pleaseth God.

But what is their ministry and custody? It is not cura animarum, care and charge of souls; that Christ taketh upon himself, and performeth it by his Spirit; but ministerium externi auxilii, to afford us outward help and relief: it is custodia corporis, they guard the bodily life chiefly. Thus we find them often employed. An angel brought Elijah his food under the juniper-tree: 1 Kings xix. 5. An angel stirred the waters at the Pool of Siloam: John v. 4. An angel was the guide of the way to Abraham’s servant: Gen. xxiv. 7, ‘He will send his angel before thee, and thou shalt take a wife unto my son from thence.’ Angels defend us against enemies: Ps. xxxiv. 7, ‘The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them;’ 2 Kings xix. 35, ‘The angel of the Lord went out and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand.’ An angel opened the prison doors to the apostles: Acts v. 19, and xii. 7.

But were not all these services extraordinary and miraculous which we may not now expect?

Ans. The visible ministry was extraordinary, proper to those times but the invisible is perpetual and ordinary, as Abraham’s servant did not see the angel in the journey. The devil worketh in and about wicked men invisibly, so do the good angels.

Secondly, Reasons why it is so.

(1.) To manifest the great love and care which God hath over his people; therefore he giveth those blessed spirits, which behold his lace, charge concerning his people on earth; as if a nobleman were charged to look to a beggar by the prince of both.

(2.) We understand the operation of finite agents better than infinite. God is so far out of the reach of our commerce, that we cannot understand the particularity of his providence.

(3 ) To counterwork the devil: evil angels are ready to hurt us, and therefore good angels are ready to preserve us. Well might the devil be so well versed in this place; he hath often felt the effects of it; he knew it by experience, being so often encountered by the good angels in his endeavours against the people of God.

(4.) To begin our acquaintance, which in heaven shall be perfected: Heb. xii. 22, ‘Ye are come to an innumerable company of angels.’

Use I. To show the happy state of God’s people. No heirs of a crown have such guards as they have. Christ dwelleth in their hearts as in a throne: Eph. iii. 17, ‘That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.’ The Holy Spirit guardeth them against all cares and fears: Phil. iv. 7, ‘And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ.’ And the good angels are as a wall and camp about them: Ps. xxxiv. 7, ‘The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them;’ Mat. xviii. 10, ‘Despise not one of these little ones, for verily I say unto you, that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.’ If the angels make an account of them, surely men should not despise them; yea, rather, God esteemeth so much of the meanest of these little ones, that the good angels, who daily enjoy God’s glorious presence, are ministering spirits appointed to attend them. If the Lord and his holy angels set such a price on the meanest Christians, we should be loth to despise and offend them.

2. It should breed some confidence and comfort in Christians in their sore straits and difficulties, when all visible help seemeth to be cut off. This invisible ministry of the angels is matter of faith: 2 Kings vi. 16, 17, ‘And he answered, Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them. And Elisha prayed, and said, Lord, I pray thee, open the young man’s eyes, that he may see. And the Lord opened the young man’s eyes, ‘and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha.’ These were no other but the angels of God, which were as an host to defend them. Open the eye of faith, you may see God, and his holy angels to secure you.

3. Take we heed how we carry ourselves, because of this honourable presence. In congregations there should be no indecency, ‘because of the angels.’ 1 Cor. xi. 10. In all our ways let us take heed that we do not step out of God’s way. Do nothing that is unseemly and dishonest; they are spies upon us. And it is profitable for us, that they may give an account of us to God with joy, and not with grief.

SERMON IV.

Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.—Mat. IV. 7.

HERE is Christ’s answer to the second temptation, where two things are observable:—

First, That Christ answered.

Secondly, What he answered.

First, That Christ answered. Christ answered, the more to convince and confound this old deceiver, that he might not think that he was ignorant of his sleights, or that he fainted in the conflict; as also to instruct us what to do in the renewed assaults of the devil, to keep up our resistance still, not letting go our sure hold, which are the scriptures.

SERMON V.

Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; and saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.—Mat. IV. 8, 9.

THIS is the third temptation. In handling it I shall use the former method, give you the history of the temptation, and observations thereupon.

In the history.

I. The introduction, ver. 8.

II. The temptation itself, with the grievousness of it, ver. 9.

III. Christ’s reply, ver. 10.

First, In the introduction we have—

1. The place the devil taketh him unto: an exceeding high mountain.

2. The fact: he showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them.

1. The place chosen for the conflict, ‘an exceeding high mountain.’ For the mountain, the scripture would not name it, and we need not anxiously inquire after it, whether any near Jericho, as some say, or as others, some mountain near Jerusalem; and possibly the highest above the rest was chosen by the tempter. The pinnacle of the temple was not proper, because Jerusalem was surrounded with higher mountains on all sides: Ps. cxxv. 2, ‘As the mountains are round about Jerusalem,’ &c. He chose an high mountain, because of the fairer prospect, where the horizon might be as spacious as was possible, and the sight not hindered by any interposing object. God took Moses into Mount Pisgah, and showed him the land of Canaan, Deut. xxxiv. 1. The devil, who affecteth to do in evil as God doth in what is good, taketh Christ into a mountain. He leadeth us high, and promiseth us high things, that suiteth with his disposition; but it endeth in a downfall that suiteth with his condition. The close is still ‘cast thyself down,’ or else, as here, ‘fall down and worship me.’ The devil’s taking him up thither is to be explained the same way with his taking him up to the pinnacle of the temple.

2. The fact, and ‘showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them.’ But how could the devil from one mountain show him all the kingdoms of the world, when there is none so high as that we can see the latitude of one kingdom, much less through all, partly through the unequal swellings of the earth, and partly through the weakness of the eye, which cannot reach so far? The sight could go no further than the horizon, and the other hemisphere is not to be seen at all; that part which we see is much less than that part which we see not. Therefore how could he show him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory thereof? Ans. These words must not be taken rigorously; but that he showed them:—(1.) In compendio. (2.) In speculo. (3.) In colloquio.

[1.] In compendio. It maybe understood of so many kingdoms as could fall under the sight of a man looking round about him from some eminent place; as God is said to show Moses all the land of Canaan, when he did actually see only a part thereof. From that high mountain the devil gave him a view of all that was to be seen from thence; many castles, towns, and fruitful fields might be seen as a sample of the rest. It is a synechdochical hyperbole, he that showeth a part of a thing, and the chiefest part, may be said to show the thing itself.

[2.] In speculo, besides what he might reach by his sight. By way of representation and external visible species, he represented to Christ all the rest of the kingdoms of the world and the pomp and glory thereof as in a map. For Satan can object to the eyes of men the species and images of divers things; and there is no absurdity to think that this way he showed his utmost art and cunning to represent the world to Christ in as splendid and inviting a manner as he could. If you ask, therefore, why he carried him to a high mountain—he might have done this in a valley or any other place as well? I answer, it is true if the discovery had been only by representation, or if the devil could have deluded Christ’s fancy or imagination, so as to impress these species upon it so far as that he should seem to see what he did not see, a valley would have served turn as well as a mountain; but this was done without it, and with it, showing the glory of the world as in a map and picture, and therefore a convenient place is chosen.

SERMON VI

Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.—Mat. IV. 10.

THIRDLY, Christ’s answer and reply, which is double:

I. By way of rebuke, defiance, and bitter reprehension: Get thee hence, Satan.

II. By way of confutation: For it is written, &c.

1. The rebuke showeth Christ’s indignation against idolatry: ‘Get thee hence, Satan.’ This was not to be endured. Twice Christ useth this form of speech, ὕπαγε, Σατανᾶ, to Satan tempting him to idolatry here, and when his servant dissuaded him from suffering: Mat. xvi. 23, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan, for thou art an offence to me; for thou savourest not the things that be of God, hut those that be of men.’ This suggestion intrenched or touched upon the glory of God, the other upon his love to mankind; and Christ could endure neither; Satan is commanded out of his presence with indignation. The same zeal we see in his servants: in Moses in case of idolatry, Exod. xxxii. 19, He brake the tables; so in case of contradiction to the faith of Christ, Paul taketh up Elymas, Acts xiii. 10, ‘O full of subtilty and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?’ Open blasphemy must be abhorred, and needeth not only a confutation but a rebuke. Besides, it was an impudent demand of Satan to require adoration from him, to whom adoration is due from every creature; to ask him to bow down before him, to whom every knee must bow: and therefore a bold temptation must have a peremptory answer. There is no mincing in such cases. It is no way contrary to that lenity that was in Christ; and it teacheth us, in such open cases of blasphemy and downright sin, not to parley with the devil, but to defy him.

2. By way of confutation: ‘For it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.’ Where observe:—

[1.] Christ answereth to the main point, not to by-matters. He doth not dispute the devil’s title, nor debate the reality of his promises; to do this would tacitly imply a liking of the temptation. No; but he disproveth the evil of the suggestion from this unclean and proud spirit: a better answer could not be given unto the tempter. So that herein we see the wisdom of Christ, which teacheth us to pass by impertinent matters, and to speak expressly to the cause in hand in all our debates with Satan and his instruments.

[2.] He citeth scripture, and thereby teacheth that the word of God, laid up in the heart and used pertinently, will ward off the blows of every temptation. This weapon Christ used all along with success, and therefore it is well called, ‘The sword of the Spirit.’ Eph. vi. 17. It is a sword, and so a weapon both offensive and defensive: Heb. iv. 12, ‘The word of God is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.’ And ‘a sword of the Spirit.’ because the Spirit is the author of it: 2 Pet. i. 21, ‘Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.’ He formed and fashioned this weapon for us; and because its efficacy dependeth on the Spirit, who timeously bringeth it to our remembrance, and doth enliven the word and maketh it effectual. Therefore it teacheth us to be much acquainted with the Lord’s written word. The timely calling to mind of a word in scripture is better than all other arguments,—a word forbidding or threatening such an evil: Ps. cxix. 11, ‘Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against thee;’ pressing the practice of such a duty when we are slow of heart: Ps. cxix. 50, ‘Thy word hath quickened me;’ or a word speaking encouragement to the soul exercised with such a cross: Heb. xii. 5, ‘Ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him;’ Ps. cxix. 92, ‘Unless thy law had been my delight, I should then have perished in mine affliction:’ still it breaketh the strength of the temptation, whatsoever it be.

[3.] The words are cited out of the book of Deuteronomy. Indeed out of that book all Christ’s answers are taken, which showeth us the excellency of that book. It was of great esteem among the Jews, and it should be so among all Christians, and it will be so of all that read it attentively. The church could not have wanted it.

[4.] The places out of which it is cited are two: Deut. vi. 13, ‘Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve him, and swear by his name;’ and again, Deut. x. 20, ‘Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve him, and to him shalt thou cleave.’ Christ, according to the Septuagint, ‘Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.’ Μόνῳ, only, which is emphatical, seemeth to be added to the text, but it is necessarily implied in the words of Moses; for his scope was to bind the people to the fear and worship of one God. None was so wicked and profane as to deny that God was to be feared and worshipped; but many might think that either the creatures or the gods of the Gentiles might be taken into fellowship of this reverence and adoration. Him is only him; ἀυτῷ is exclusive, if μόνῳ were left out. See the place, Deut. vi. 13, 14, ‘Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve him, and shalt swear by his name; ye shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the people which are round about you.’ And in other places it is expressed; as 1 Sam. vii. 3, ‘If you prepare your hearts unto the Lord, and serve him only.’ The devil excepts not against this interpretation, as being fully convinced and silenced by it. And it is a known story that this was the cause why the pagans would not admit the God of the Jews, as revealed in the Old Testament, or Christ, as revealed in the New, to be an object of adoration, because he would be worshipped alone, all other deities excluded. The gods of the heathens were good-fellow gods, would admit partnership; as common whores are less jealous than the married wife: though their lovers went to never so many besides them selves, yet to them it was all one, whensoever they returned to them and brought their gifts and offerings.

[5.] In this place quoted by our Saviour there is employed a distinction of inward and outward worship. Fear is for inward worship, serve is for outward worship, and the profession of the same. Fear in Moses is expounded worship by Christ; so Mat. xv. 9, compared with Isa. xxix. 13, ‘In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men;’ but in the prophet it is ‘Their fear towards me is taught by the precepts of men.’ He that worshippeth feareth and reverenceth what he worshippeth, or else all his worship is but a compliment and empty formality. So that the fear of God is that reverence and estimation that we have of God, the serving of God is the necessary effect and fruit of it; for service is an open testimony of our reverence and worship. In this place you have worship and service, both which are due to God only. But that you may perceive the force of our Saviour’s argument, and also of this precept, I shall a little dilate on the word service, what the scripture intendeth thereby. Satan saith, ‘Bow down and worship me:’ Christ saith, ‘Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only .shalt thou serve.’ Under service, prayer and thanksgiving is comprehended: Isa. xliv. 17, ‘And the residue thereof he maketh a god, even his graven image: he falleth down unto it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me, for thou art my god.’ This is one of the external acts whereby the idolater showeth the esteem of his heart: so Jer. ii. 27, ‘Saying to a stock, Thou art my father; and to a stone, Thou hast brought me forth.’ So, under serving, sacrifice is comprehended: 2 Kings xvii. 35, ‘Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them.’ Again, burning of incense: Jer. xviii. 15, ‘My people have forgotten me, they have burnt incense to vanity.’ Preaching for them; Jer. ii. 8, ‘The pastors also have transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal.’ Asking counsel of them: Hosea iv. 12, ‘My people ask counsel at their stocks, and their staff declareth unto them; for the spirit of whoredoms hath caused them to err, and they have gone a whoring from under their God.’ So building temples, altars, or other monuments unto them: Hosea viii. 14, ‘Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples;’ and xii. 11, ‘Their altars are as heaps in the furrows of the fields.’ Erecting of ministries, or doing any ministerial work for their honour: Amos v. 26, ‘Ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and Chium your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves;’ as God appointed the Levites to bear the tabernacle for communion in the service of them: 1 Cor. x. 18, ‘Are not they that eat of the sacrifices partakers of the altar?’ ver. 21, ‘Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of devils; ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table and of the table of devils.’ So 2 Cor. vi. 16, 17, ‘What agreement hath the temple of God with idols?’ In short, for it is endless to reckon up all which the scripture comprehendeth under service and gestures of reverence: Exod. xx. 5, ‘Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them.’ Bowing the knee: 1 Kings xix. 18, ‘I have left me seven thousand in Israel, which have not bowed the knee to Baal.’ Kissing them: Hosea xiii. 18, ‘They kiss the calves.’ Lifting up the eyes: Ezek. ii. 15. ‘He hath not lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel.’ Stretching out the hand: Ps. xliv. 20, ‘If we have stretched our hands to a strange God.’ So that you see all gestures of reverence are forbidden as terminated to idols. Thus strict and jealous is God in his law, that we might not bow down and worship the devil, or anything that is set up by him.

Doct. That religious service and religious worship is due to God only, and not to be given to saint, or angel, or any creature.

Thus Christ defeateth the devil’s temptation, and thus should we be under the awe of God’s authority, that we may not yield to the like temptation when the greatest advantages imaginable are offered to us. Here I shall show:—

I. What is worship, and the kinds of it.

II. I shall prove that worship is due to God.

III. Not only worship, but service.

IV. That both are due to God alone.

1. What is worship? In the general it implieth these three things: an act of the judgment, apprehending an excellency in the object worshipped; an act of the will, or a readiness to yield to it, suitably to the degree of excellency which we apprehend in it; and an external act of the body whereby it is expressed. This is the general nature of worship, common to all the sorts of it.

2. The kinds of it. Now worship is of two kinds—civil and religious. Religious worship is a special duty due to God, and commanded in the first table. Civil honour and worship is commanded in the second table. They are expressed by ‘godliness and righteousness,’ 1 Tim. vi. 11; and ‘godliness and honesty,’ 1 Tim. ii. 2.

[1.] For religious worship. There is a twofold religious worship. One when we are right for the object, and do only worship the true God; this is required in the first commandment. The other when we are right for the means, when we worship the true God by such means as he hath appointed, not by an image, idol, or outward representation. Opposite to this there is an evil idolatrous sinful worship, when that which is due to the Creator is given to any creature; which is primary or secondary. Primary, when the image or idol is accounted God, or worshipped as such, as the sottish heathens do. Or secondary, when the images themselves are not worshipped as having any godhead properly in themselves, but as they relate to, represent, or are made use of, in the worship of him who is accounted God. We shall find this done by the wiser heathens, worshipping their images, not as gods themselves, but as intending to worship their gods in these and by these. So also among some who would be called Christians. Thus the representing the true God by images is condemned, Deut. iv. 15-17, ‘Take ye good heed unto yourselves, for ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb, out of the midst of the fire, lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female.’ Again, sinful worship is twofold: more gross of idols, representing false gods, called worshipping of devils; or more subtle, when worship is given to saints or holy men: Acts x. 25, 26, ‘As Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his feet, and worshipped him. But Peter took him up, saying, Stand up; I myself also am a man.’ Acts xiv. 14. 15, ‘Paul and Barnabas, when they heard this, rent their clothes, and ran in among the people, crying out and saying, Sirs, why do you these things? we also are men of like passions with you,’ &c. Or to angels: Rev. xxii. 8, ‘When John fell at the angel’s feet to worship him, he said, See thou do it not; for I am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren the prophets.’

[2.] Civil worship is when we give men and angels due reverence, and—

(1.) With respect to their stations and relations, whatever their qualifications be, as to magistrates, ministers, parents, great men; we are to reverence and honour them according to their degree and quality: according to the fifth commandment, ‘Honour thy father and thy mother;’ 1 Thes. v. 13, and to ‘esteem them very highly in love for their work’s sake.’ Or,

(2.) A reverential worshipping or esteeming them for their qualifications of wisdom and holiness: Acts ii. 47, Good men had ‘favour with all the people.’ Such respect living saints get, such angels may have when they appear: Gen. xviii. 2, Abraham ‘bowed himself towards the ground:’ and Gen. xix. 1, Lot ‘rose up to meet them, and bowed himself with his face towards the ground.’

Now, whether the worship be civil or religious may be gathered by the circumstances thereof; as if the act, end, or other circumstances be religious, the action or worship itself must be so also. It is one thing to bow the knee in salutation, another thing to bow in prayer before an image.

II. That worship is due to God. These two notions live and die together—that God is, and that he ought to be worshipped. It appeareth by our Saviour’s reasoning, John iv. 24, ‘God is a spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.’ He giveth directions about the manner of worship, but supposeth it that he will be worshipped. When God had proclaimed his name and manifested himself to Moses, Exod. xxxiv. 8, ‘Moses made haste, and bowed himself and worshipped.’ It is the crime charged upon the Gentiles, that when they knew God, they glorified him not as God,’ Rom. i. 21. They knew a divine power, but did not give him a worship, at least competent to his nature. God pleadeth his right: Mal. i. 6, ‘If I be a father, where is mine honour? If I be a master, where is my fear?’ And God, who is the common parent and absolute master of all, must have both a worship and honour, in which reverence and fear is mixed with love and joy; so that if God be, worship is certainly due to him. They that have no worship are as if they had no God. The psalmist proveth atheism by that: Ps. xiv. 1, ‘The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God;’ and ver. 4, ‘They call not upon God.’ The acknowledgment of a king doth imply subjection to his laws; so doth the acknowledgment of his God imply a necessity of worshipping him.

III. That both worship and service is due to God: ‘Him shalt thou worship, and him shalt thou serve.’ The worship of God is both internal and external: the internal consisteth in that love and reverence which we owe to him; the external, in those offices and duties by which our honour and respect to God is signified and expressed: both are necessary, both believing with the heart, and confession with the mouth: Rom. x. 9, 10, ‘If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.’ The soul and life of our worship and godliness lieth in our faith, love, reverence, and delight in God above all other things; the visible expression of it is in invocation, thanksgiving, prayers, and sacraments, and other acts of outward worship. Now, it is not enough that we own God with the heart, but we must own him with the body also. In the heart: ‘Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling.’ Ps. ii. 11. Such as will become the greatness and goodness of God; with outward and bodily worship you must now own him in all those prescribed duties in which these affections are acted. The spirit must be in it, and the body also. There are two extremes. Some confine all their respect to God to bodily worship and external forms: Mat. xvi. 8, ‘This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their hearts are far from me.’ They use the external rites of worship, but their affections are no way suited to the God whom they worship: it is the heart must be the principal and chief agent in the business, without which it is but the carcase of a duty, without the life and the soul. The other extreme is, that we are not called to an external bodily worship under the gospel. Why did he then appoint the ordinances of preaching, prayer, singing of psalms, baptism, and the Lord’s supper? God, that made the whole man, body and soul, must be worshipped of the whole man. Therefore, besides the inward affections, there must be external actions, whereby we express our respect and reverence to God.

IV. That both these, religious worship and service, are due to God alone. I prove it by these arguments:—

1. Those things which are due to God as God are due to him alone, and no creature, without sacrilege, can claim any part and fellowship in that worship and adoration, neither can it be given to any creature without idolatry. But now religious worship and service is due to God as God: ‘He is thy Lord, and worship thou him.’ Ps. xlv. 11. Our worship and service is due to him, not only for his super-eminent excellency, but because of our creation, preservation, and redemption. Therefore we must worship and serve him, and him only: Isa. xlii. 8, ‘I am the Lord; that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, nor my praise to graven images.’ God challengeth it as Jehovah, the great self-being, from whom we have received life and breath, and all things. This glory God will not suffer to be given to another. And therefore the apostle showeth the wretched estate of the Galatians, chap. iv. 8: ‘When ye knew not God, ye did service to them that by nature are no gods;’ that is, they worshipped for gods those things which really were no gods. There is no kind of religious worship or service, under any name whatsoever, to be given to any creature, but to God only; for what is due to the Creator as Creator cannot be given to the creature.

2. The nature of religious worship is such, that it cannot be terminated on any object but God; for it is a profession of our dependence and subjection. Now, whatever invisible power this worship is tendered unto must be omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent. Omniscient, who knows the thoughts, cogitations, secret purposes of our heart, which God alone doth: 1 Kings viii. 39, ‘Give unto every one according to his ways, whose heart thou knowest; for thou, even thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men.’ It is God’s prerogative to know the inward motions and thoughts of the heart, whether they be sincere or no in their professions of dependence and subjection. So omnipresent, that he may be ready at hand to help us and relieve us: Jer. xxiii. 23, 24, ‘Am I a God at hand, and not a God afar off? Can any hide himself in secret places, that I shall not see him? saith the Lord. Do not I fill heaven and earth? saith the Lord.’ The palace of heaven doth not so confine him and enclose him but that he is present everywhere by his essential presence, and powerful and efficacious providence. Besides omnipotent: Ps. lvii. 2, ‘I will cry unto God most high, unto God who performeth all things for me.’ Alas! what a cold formality were prayer if we should speak to those that know us not, and who are not near to help us, or have no sufficiency of power to help us! Therefore these professions of dependence and subjection must be made to God alone.

3. To give religious worship to the creatures, it is without command, without promise, and without examples, and therefore without any faith in the worshipper, or acceptance of God. Where is there any command or direction, or approved example, of this in scripture? God will accept only what he commanded, and without a promise it will be unprofitable to us: and it is a superstitious innovation of our own to devise any religious worship for which there is no example at all whereby it may be recommended to us. Certainly no action can be commended to us as godly which is not prescribed of God, by whose word and institution every action is sanctified which otherwise would be common; and no action can be profitable to us which God hath not promised to accept, or hath accepted from his people. But giving religious worship to a creature is of this nature.

SERMON VII.

Then the devil leaveth him, and behold angels came and ministered unto him.—Mat. IV. 11.

IN these words you have the issue and close of Christ’s temptations. The issue is double:—(1.) In respect of the adversary; (2.) In respect of Christ himself.

I. In respect of the adversary: then the devil leaveth him.

II. In respect of Christ himself: behold angels came and ministered unto him.

I shall consider in both the history and the observations.

First, The history of it, as it properly belongeth to Christ: and there—

1. Of the first branch, the recess of Satan: ‘Then the devil leaveth him.’

[1.] It was necessary to be known that Christ had power to chase away the devil at his pleasure; that, as he was an instance of temptations, so he might be to us a pattern of victory and conquest. If Satan had continued tempting, this would have been obscured, which would have been an infringement of comfort to us. The devil being overcome by Christ, he may be also overcome by us Christians: 1 John v. 18, ‘He that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not.’ That is, he useth all care and diligence to keep himself pure, that the devil draw him not into the sin unto death, and those deliberate, scandalous sins which lead to it. Christ having overcome Satan, in our name and nature, showeth us the way how to fight against him and overcome him.

[2.] Christ had a work to do in the valley, and therefore was not always to be detained by temptations in the wilderness. The Spirit, that led him thither to be tempted, led him back again into Galilee to preach the gospel: Luke iv. 14, ‘Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee.’ All things are timed and ordered by God, and he limiteth Satan how far and how long he shall tempt.

[3.] In Luke it is said, chap. iv. 13, ‘He departed from him, ἄχρι καιροῦ, for a season.’ He never tempted him again in this solemn way hand to hand; but either abusing the simplicity of his own disciple: Mat. xvi. 22, 23, ‘Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord; this shall not be unto thee. But he turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me Satan! thou art an offence unto me;’ or else by his instruments, laying plots to take away his life; as often, but especially in his passion: Luke xxii. 53, ‘This is your hour, and the power of darkness.’ So John xiv. 30, ‘The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me.’ Satan shall join with the Jews to destroy me, but they shall find nothing to lay to my charge; nor, indeed, have they power to do me any hurt, but that, in obedience to my Father’s will, I mean voluntarily to lay down my life for sinners. So he had a permitted power over him, and was the prime instrumental cause of his sufferings; set aside his voluntary condescension to be a ransom for sinners, Satan had not any power over him, or challenge against him. Well, then, though he lost his victory, he retained his malice.

2. The second branch, the access of the good angels: ‘And behold the angels came and ministered to him.’ There observe three things:

[1.] The note of attention: behold. The Holy Ghost would excite our minds, and have us mark this: the angels are always at hand to serve Christ, but now they come to him in some singular manner some notable appearance there was of them, probably in a visible form and shape; and so they presented themselves before the Lord to minister to him, as the devil set himself before him to molest and vex him. As Christ’s humiliation and human nature was to be manifested by the devil’s coming to him and tempting assaults, so the honour of his divine nature by the ministry of angels, lest his temptations should seem to derogate from his glory. When we read the story of his temptations, how he was tempted in all parts like us, we might seem to take scandal, as if he were a mere man; therefore his humiliation is counterbalanced with the special honour done to him: he was tempted as man, but, as God, ministered unto by angels.

[2.] Why they came not before the devil was departed? I answer:—

(1.) Partly to show that Christ had no help but his own when he grappled with Satan. When the temptations were ended, then the good angels came, lest the victory should seem to be gotten by their help and assistance. They were admitted to the triumph, but they were not admitted to the fight: they were not spectators only in the conflict (for the battle was certainly fought before God and angels), but partners in the triumph: they went away to give place to the combat, but they came visibly to congratulate the conqueror after the battle was fought and the victory gotten. Our Lord would alone foil the devil, and, when that was done, the angels came and ministered unto him.

(2.) Partly to show us that the going of the one is the coming of the other. When the devil is gone, the angels come. Certainly it is true on the contrary: 1 Sam. xvi. 14, ‘The Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord troubled him;’ and it is true in this sense, if we entertain the temptation, we banish the good angels from us: there is no place for the good angels till the tempter be repulsed.

[3.] Why now, and to what end, was this ministry?

(1.) To put honour on the Redeemer, who is the head and lord of the angels: Eph. i. 20, 21, ‘He hath set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principalities and powers, &c., and gave him to be the head over all things to the church.’ So 1 Pet. iii. 22, ‘Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels, and authorities, and powers, being made subject to him.’ Christ, not only as God, but as mediator, hath all of them subject to him: Heb. i. 6, ‘And unto the Son he saith, Let all the angels of God worship him.’ They, as subjects and servants, are bound to obey him. Therefore, on all occasions they attend on Christ; at his birth: Luke ii. 13, 14, ‘A multitude of the heavenly host praised God, saying, Glory be to God on high, on earth peace, good will towards men.’ Now, in his temptations, ‘The angels came and ministered unto him.’ At his passion: Luke xxii. 43, ‘There appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him.’ At his resurrection, ‘An angel rolled away the stone from the grave,’ and attested the truth of it, Mat. xxviii. 2. At his ascension, the angels declared the manner of his going to heaven, and return to judgment, Acts i. 10, 11. So now they come to attend Christ, as subjects on their prince, to tender their service and homage to him, and receive his commands.

(2.) For his consolation, inward and outward.

First, Inward, as messengers sent from God; and so their coming was a token of God’s special love and favour to him, and care over him. The devil had mentioned in one of his temptations, ‘He shall give his angels charge over thee.’ This is a truth, and in due time to be verified; not at Satan’s instance, but when God pleased. Therefore it was a comfort to Christ to have solemn messengers sent from heaven to applaud his triumph.

Secondly, Outward, they were sent to serve him, either to convey him back from the mountain, where Satan had set him, or to bring him food, as they did to Elijah: 1 Kings xix. 5, 6, ‘And as he lay and slept under a juniper-tree, behold then an angel touched him, and said unto him, Arise and eat. And he looked, and behold there was a cake baken on the coals, and a cruse of water at his head: and he did eat and drink, and laid him down again.’ Διακονεῖν, the word here used, is often taken in that sense in the New Testament: Mat. viii. 15, ‘She arose and ministered unto them.’ that is, served them at meat. So Mat. xxv. 44, ‘When saw we thee an hungered, &c., and did not minister unto thee?’ The name of deacons is derived hence, as they ‘served tables.’ or provided meat for the poor, Acts vi. 2. So Luke x. 40, ‘My sister hath left me, διακανεῖν, to serve alone.’ meaning, to prepare provisions for the family: so Luke xvii. 8, ‘Gird thyself and serve me.’ that is, at the table: again, Luke xxii. 27, ‘Whether is greater, he that sits at meat, or he that serveth?’ or ministereth. So John xii. 2: ‘They made a supper, and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of those that sat at the table with him.’ Thus the angels ministered unto Christ. This sort of ministry agreeth with what was said of his hunger, which was the occasion of Satan’s temptations.

Secondly, The observations. As Christ is a pattern of all those providences which are dispensed to the people of God.

Doct. 1. That the days of God’s people’s conflicts and trials will not always last.

TO THE CHRISTIAN READER.

HERE are presented to thy view some of the further profitable and pious labours of that eminent divine, Dr Manton (now with God), who though, like a tree full of fruit, he has already yielded much fruit, yet still more and more falls from him. Since his much to be lamented death, two very large volumes (with some lesser) of his sermons have been published, which give a clear discovery to the world of his great abilities for, and great diligence in, the office and work of the minis try. Now this small piece succeeds, which, in comparison of the former, is but a poor stripling,—but as ‘the shaking of an olive tree, as the gleaning grapes when the vintage is over.’ Yet let it not be rejected or slighted upon that account; for though it is not so bulky as they, yet, according to its proportion, it is of equal value, and shows the same head and heart which they do.

My pen (upon this opportunity) would fain be launching forth into the commendation of the worthy author, but I will not suffer it, considering how little he needs that from any, and how much he is above it as from me. Neither will I suffer it to run out in the commending of these sermons; for I hope, to impartial and judicious readers, they will commend themselves (the best way of commending). I only recommend them, as judging them worthy of the perusal of all who are desirous of a fuller knowledge of our Lord Jesus.

For he is the grand subject treated of in them. His person, offices, works, blessings, are here described, asserted, vindicated, and improved. Our redemption by his blood; his being the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature; his creating and sustaining all things; his headship over the church, pre-existence before all created beings; his being the first-born from the dead, the union of the two natures in his person; his reconciling of sinners to God through the blood of his cross,—these are the heads insisted upon in these sermons (the author following the apostle, Col. i. 14-20).

And are not these great points, of a very sublime nature, containing the very vitals of gospel revelation? Can ministers preach, print too much of them? Can private Christians hear, read, meditate too much of them? Oh, they are the τὰ βάθη, ‘the deep things of God.’ in which is manifested the πολυποίκιλος σοφία, ‘the manifold wisdom of God.’ which ‘the angels desire to look into.’ which are the wonder and astonishment of heaven, which put such a transcendent excellency upon the knowledge of Christ. Should we not, therefore, thankfully receive and diligently peruse all discourses that may clear up our light in and about these profound mysteries? I hope the consideration hereof will make these sermons acceptable to many gracious souls. They all hanging upon this string, and pointing to this argument (of what Christ is, has done, suffered, and procured for believers), they are not unfitly put together, and printed by themselves, in this small volume.

Several of the points mentioned are controversial; for a long track of time there has been hot disputes about them. What volumes pro and con have been written, both by ancient and modern divines, about them! But our reverend author does not so much concern himself in what is polemical and controversial, but chose rather in a plainer way (as best suiting with sermon-work) to assert and prove the truth by scriptural testimonies and arguments: and that he has done to the full.

Header, whoever thou art into whose hands these sermons shall come, let me assure thee they are the genuine work of the person whose name they bear. They were copied out from, and according to, his own notes, by one who I am sure would be as exact therein as possibly he could. But how earnestly could I wish, if God had not seen it good to order it otherwise, that the author himself might have lived to have reviewed and polished them; for what hand so fit to polish the stone as that which cuts it? But now what is amiss must be left to the understanding reader to discover, and to the candid reader to pardon.

Christian, I commit thee to God; may he bless thee, and all the labours of his faithful servants (whether living or dead), to the promoting of thy spiritual and eternal good. Which he ardently desires, who is,—

Thine to serve thee in our Lord Jesus,

Tho. Jacomb.

REDEMPTION BY CHRIST.

SERMON I.

In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins.—Col. I. 14.

THE apostle, in the former verse, had spoken of our slavery and bond age to Satan, from which Christ came to deliver us; now, because sin is the cause of it, he cometh to speak of our redemption from sin: ‘In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins.’ Here is—

I. The author.

II. The benefit.

III. The price.

The point is this:—

Doct. That one principal part of our redemption by Christ is remission of sins. Here I shall show you:—

1. What remission of sins is.

2. The nature of redemption.

3. That remission of sins is a part, and a principal part of it.

First, What remission of sins is. Both terms must be explained—what sin is, and what is the forgiveness of sin.

For the first, sin is a violation of the law of the eternal and living God: 1 John iii. 4, ‘Whosoever committeth sin, transgresseth also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law.’ God is the lawgiver, who hath given a righteous law to his subjects, under the dreadful penalty of a curse. In his law there are two things—the precept and the sanction. The precept is the rule of our duty, which showeth what we must do, or not do. The sanction or penalty showeth what God will do, or might justly do, if he should deal with us according to the merit of our actions. Accordingly, in sin, there is the fault and the guilt.

[1.] The fault: that man, who is God’s subject, and so many ways obliged to him by his benefits, instead of keeping this law, should break it upon light terms, and swerve from the rule of his duty, being carried away by his own ill-disposed will and base lusts. It is a great and heinous offence, for which he becometh obnoxious to the judgment of God.

[2.] The guilt: which is a liableness to punishment, and that not ordinary punishment, but the vengeance of the eternal God, who every moment may break in upon us. Where there is sin, there will be guilt; and where there is guilt, there will be punishment, unless we be pardoned, and God looseneth the chains wherewith we be bound.

Secondly, Forgiveness of sin is a dissolving the obligation to punishment, or a freedom, in God’s way and method, from all the sad and woful consequences of sin. Understand it rightly.

[1.] It is not a disannulling the act, as it is a natural action; such a fact we did, or omitted to do; factum, infactum fieri nequit—that which is done, cannot be undone. And, therefore, though it be said, Jer. l. 20, ‘The iniquity of Jacob shall be sought after, and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found; for I will pardon them whom I reserve;’ yet that must not be understood as if God would abolish the action, and make it as if it had never been, for that is impossible. But he would pass by, and overlook it as to punishment.

[2.] Nor is it abolished as a faulty or criminal action, contrary to the law of God. The sins we have committed are sins still, such actions as the law condemneth. Forgiveness is not the making of a fault to be no fault. An accused person may be vindicated as innocent, but if he be pardoned, he is pardoned as an offender. He is not reputed as one that never culpably omitted any duty, or committed any sin, but his fault is forgiven upon such terms as our offended governor pleaseth ‘I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and forgive all their sins,’ Heb. viii. 12. They are pardoned as sins.

[3.] Nor is the merit of the sinful act lessened; in itself it deserveth condemnation to punishment. Merito operis, it is in itself damnable, but quoad eventum: Rom. viii. 1, ‘There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.’ &c.; because the grace of the gospel dischargeth us from it. We must still own ourselves deserving the wrath of God, which maketh for our constant humiliation and admiration of grace; so that he that is pardoned still deserveth punishment.

[4.] It remaineth, therefore, that forgiveness of sin is a dissolving the obligation to punishment, or passing by the fault, so as it shall not rise up in judgment against us to our confusion or destruction: the fault is the sinner’s act, the punishment the judge’s, which he may forbear on certain terms stated in the law of grace. He passeth by the fault so far, that it shall not be a ground of punishment to us. I prove it:—

(1.) From the nature of the thing; for there is such a relation between the fault and the guilt, the sin and the punishment, that the one cannot be without the other. There can be no punishment without a preceding fault and crime. Therefore, if the judge will not impute the fault, there must needs be an immunity from punishment, for the cause being taken away, the effect ceaseth, and the sin committed by us is the meritorious cause of punishment. If God will cover that, and overlook it, then forgiveness is a dissolving the obligation to punishment.

(2.) From the common rule of speaking used among men, for surely the scripture speaketh intelligibly. Now in the common way of speaking, he cannot be said to forgive or remit a fault that exacteth the whole punishment of it. How can a magistrate be said to forgive an offender, when the offender beareth the punishment which the law determineth? And what do men pray for to God, when they pray for the forgiveness of sins, but that they may be exempted from the punishment which they have deserved?

(3.) It would seem to impeach the justice and mercy of God, if he should exact the punishment where he hath pardoned the offence. His justice, to flatter men with hopes of remitting the debt, where he requireth the payment; his mercy, in making such fair offers of reconciliation, when still liable to his vindictive justice. There may be indeed effects of his fatherly anger, but not of his vindictive wrath.

(4.) The phrases, and way of speaking in scripture, by which forgiveness of sin is set forth, show God doth blot out our sins: Ps. li. 2, ‘Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.’ And cover them: Ps. xxxii. 1, ‘Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.’ To cast them behind his back: Isa. xxxviii. 17, ‘Thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.’ And cast them into the bottom of the sea: Micah vii. 19, ‘Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.’ To remember them no more: Jer. xxxi. 34, ‘I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.’ By such emphatical metaphors doth it express God’s free and full forgiveness, if we seriously enter into his peace; and do clearly show, that if God punisheth sins, he doth remember them; if he avenge them, he imputeth them; if they are brought into the judgment against us, they are not covered; if he searcheth after them, he doth not cast them behind his back; if he bringeth them into light, he doth not cast them into the depths of the sea; much more if he punish us for them.

Secondly, The nature of redemption.

What is redemption by the blood of Christ?

In opening it to you, I shall prove six things:—

1. A captivity or bondage.

2. That from thence we are freed by a ransom, or price paid.

3. That none but Christ was fit to give this ransom.

4. That nothing performed by Christ was sufficient till he laid down his life.

5. That thence there is a liberty resulting to us.

6. That we do not actually partake of the benefit of this ransom till we be in Christ.

[1.] Our being redeemed supposeth a captivity and bondage. All men in their unrenewed estate are slaves to sin and Satan, and subject to the wrath of God. That we are slaves to sin appeareth by scripture and experience: Titus iii. 3, ‘Serving divers lusts and pleasures;’ John viii. 34, ‘Whosoever committeth sin, is the servant of sin.’ Men imagine a life spent in vanity and pleasure to be a very good life; it were so, if liberty were to be determined by doing what we list, rather than what we ought. But since it is not, experience showeth that they are convinced of their brutish satisfactions as mean and base, yet they cannot leave them, for that true and solid happiness offered by Christ. Now as they are under sin, so they are under Satan, ‘who worketh in the children of disobedience,’ Eph. ii. 2; and hath a great power over wicked men in the world, who fall to his share, as the executioner of God’s curse, and are taken captive by him at his will and pleasure, 2 Tim. ii. 26. This is the woful captivity and servitude of carnal men, that they fall as a ready prey into the mouth of the roaring lion. Now, for this they are liable to the curse and wrath of God; therefore called ‘children of wrath, even as others,’ Eph. ii. 3; that is, obnoxious to his righteous displeasure and punishment. Thus were we lost in ourselves under sin, Satan, and the wrath of God, from which we could no way free ourselves; and if grace had not opened a way for us to escape, what should we have done?

[2.] To recover us, there was a price to be paid by way of ransom to God. We are not delivered from this bondage by prayer or entreaty, nor by strong hand or mere force, nor yet by the sole condescension and pity of the injured party, without seeking reparation of the wrong done, but by the payment of a sufficient price, and just satisfaction to provoked justice. This price was not paid indeed to Satan, who detaineth souls in slavery as a rigid usurping tyrant or merciless jailor (from him indeed we are delivered by force), but the price was paid to God. Man had not sinned against Satan, but against God, to whom it belongeth to condemn or absolve. And God being satisfied, Satan hath no power over us, but is put out of office, as the executioner hath nothing to do when the judge and law is satisfied; Now, that redemption implieth the paying of a price is clear, because the word importeth it, and the scripture often uses this metaphor: Mat. xx. 28, ‘The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many;’ 1 Tim. ii. 6, ‘Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.’ Redemption in the general is a recovery out of our lost estate. God could ‘have saved men by the grace of confirmation, but he chose rather by the grace of redemption. This recovery was not by a forcible rescue, but by a ransom. Christ, in recovering his people out of their lost estate, is sometimes set forth as a lamb, sometimes as a lion. In dealing with God, we consider him as the lamb slain, Rev. v. 5, 6: in dealing with Satan, and the enemies of our salvation, he doth as a lion recover the prey. But why was a ransom necessary? Because God had made a former covenant, which was not to be quit and wholly made void but upon valuable consideration, lest his justice, wisdom, holiness, veracity, authority should fall to the ground.

(1.) The honour of his governing justice was to be secured and freed from any blemish, that the awe of God might be kept up in the world: Rom. iii. 5, 6, and Gen. xviii. 25, ‘That be far from thee, to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked; and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that be far from thee: shall not the judge of all the earth do right?’ If God should absolutely pardon without satisfaction equivalent for the wrong done, how should God else be known and reverenced as the just and holy governor of the world? Therefore Rom. iii. 25, 26, it is said, ‘Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness. for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness; that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.’

(2.) His wisdom. The law was not given by God in jest, but in the greatest earnest that ever law was given. Now, if the law should be recalled without any more ado, the lawgiver would run the hazard of levity, mutability, and imprudence in constituting so solemn a transaction to no purpose. Paul was troubled when forced to retract his word, 2 Cor. i. 17, 18; that his word should be yea to-day, and nay to-morrow. Therefore, when God had said, Thus I will govern the world, he was not to part with the law upon light terms.

(3.) His holy nature would not permit it. There needed some way to be found out, to signify his purest holiness, his hatred and detestation of sin, and that it should not be pardoned without some marks of his displeasure. His soul hates the wicked, and the righteous God loveth righteousness, Ps. xi. 6.

(4.) His authority. It would be a derogation from the authority of his law, if it might be broken, and there be no more ado about it. Now, that all the world might know that it is a dangerous thing to transgress his laws, and might hear and fear, and do no more presumptuously, God appointed this course, that the penalty of his law should be executed upon our surety, when he undertook our reconciliation with God, Gal. iv. 4.

(5.) The veracity and truth of God. It bindeth the truth of God, which sinners are apt to question: Gen. iii. 5, ‘Hath God said?’ and Deut. xxix. 19, 20. We look upon the threatenings of the law as a vain scarecrow; therefore, for the terror and warning of sinners for the future, God would not release his wrath, nor release us from the power of sin and Satan, which was the consequent of it, without a price and valuable compensation.

[3.] None was fit to give this ransom but Jesus Christ, who was God-man. He was man to undertake it in our name, and God to perform it in his own strength; a man that he might be made under the law, and humbled even to the death of the cross for our sakes; and all this was elevated beyond the worth of created actions and sufferings by the divine nature which was in him, which perfumed his humanity, and all done by it and in it. This put the stamp upon the metal, and made it current coin, imposed an infinite value upon his finite obedience and sufferings. By taking human nature a price was put into his hands to lay down for us: Heb. x. 15, and his divine nature made it sufficient and responsible, for it was the blood of God: Acts xx. 28, ‘Feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood;’ and Heb. ix. 13, ‘For if the blood of bulls and goats, and the ashes of an heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?’ It was that flesh and blood which was assumed into the unity of his person as a slip or branch grafted into a stock is the branch of the stock, and the fruit of it is the fruit of the stock. A naked creature without this union could not have satisfied the justice of God for us. This made his blood a precious blood, and his obedience a precious obedience. In short, God-man, the Son of God and the son of Adam, was he that redeemed us. So, in short, there were different parties to be dealt with before the fruit of redemption could be obtained: God, satan, man. God was an enemy that could not be overcome, but must be reconciled; Satan was a usurper, and was to be vanquished with a strong hand; man was unable and unwilling to look after the fruits of redemption, and our obstinacy and unbelief could only be overcome by the Spirit of Christ.

[4.] Nothing performed by Christ could be a sufficient ransom for this end, unless he had crowned all his other actions and sufferings by laying down his life, and undergoing a bloody and violent death. This was the completing and crowning act. Partly to answer the types of the law, wherein no remission was represented without a bloody sacrifice; partly from the nature of the thing, and the fulness of the satisfaction required until all that was finished, John viii. 20. Death was that which was threatened to sin, death was that which was feared by the sinner. Many ignorant people will say the least drop of Christ’s blood was enough to save a thousand worlds. If so, his circumcision had been enough without his death. But Christ is not glorified but lessened by such expressions. Surely his death was necessary, or God would never have appointed it; his bloody death suited with God’s design. God’s design was to carry on our recovery in such a way as might make sin more hateful, and obedience more acceptable to us.

(1.) Sin more hateful by his agonies, blood, shame, death; no less remedy would serve the turn, to procure the pardon and destruction of it: Rom. viii. 3, ‘By sin he condemned sin in the flesh;’ that is, by a sin-offering. God showed a great example of his wrath against all sin by punishing sin in the flesh of Christ. His design was for ever to leave a brand upon it, and to furnish us with a powerful mortifying argument against it, by the sin-offering and ransom for souls. Surely it is no small matter for which the Son of God must die! At Golgotha, sin was seen in its own colours—there he showed how much he hateth it, and loveth purity.

(2.) To commend obedience. Christ’s suffering death for the sin of man at the command of his Father was the noblest piece of ser vice and the highest degree of obedience that ever could be performed to God—beyond anything that can be done by men or angels. There was in it so much love to God, pity to man, so much self-denial, so much humility and patience, and so much resignation of himself to God, who appointed him to be the redeemer and surety of man, to do this office for him, as cannot be paralleled. The great thing in it was obedience: Rom. v. 14, ‘By the obedience of one shall many be made righteous;’ so Phil. ii. 7, God was not delighted in mere blood, but in blood offered in obedience. All his former actions, together with his death and sufferings, make but one entire act of eminent obedience; but his painful and cursed death, so willingly and readily undergone, was the crowning act. The formal reason of the merit was that Christ came to fulfil the will of God, ‘by which will we are sanctified,’ Heb. x. 10, therefore his death was necessary.

[5.] From this ransom and act of obedience there is a liberty resulting unto us, for the redeemed are let go when the ransom is paid. Now this liberty is a freedom from sin, that we may become the servants of God: Rom. vi. 22, ‘Being made free from sin, ye became servants of righteousness.’ Christ came not to free us from the duty of the law, but the penalty and curse thereof. To free us from the duty of the law is to promote the devil’s interest. No; he freed us from the wrath of God that we may serve him cheerfully, to establish God’s interest upon surer and more comfortable terms, to restore us to God’s favour and service: to God’s favour, by the pardon of sin; to his service by writing his laws on our hearts and minds. Sometimes our redemption from the curse is spoken of: Gal. iii. 13, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.’ Sometimes our redemption from sin: Titus ii. 14, ‘Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity;’ and so by consequence from the power of the devil, which is built on the curse of the law and reign^of sin. Satan’s power over us doth flow from the sentence of the condemnation pronounced by the law against sinners, and consists in that dominion sin hath obtained over them. If the curse of the law be disannulled, and the power of sin broken, he is spoiled of his power: Col. ii. 14,. 15, ‘Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; and having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them.’

[6.] That we are not partakers of this liberty, nor of the benefit of this ransom, till we are in him, and united to him by faith, for the text saith, ‘In whom we have redemption by his blood.’ Certainly we must be turned from Satan to God before we are capable of receiving the forgiveness of sins, Acts xxvi. 18. We do not actually partake of the privileges of Christ’s kingdom till we be first his subjects: ‘Who hath delivered us from the power of Satan, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.’ Christ and his people are an opposite state to the devil and his instruments. While we are under the opposite power we belong not to Christ, and the privileges of his kingdom belong not to us; but as soon as we are translated and put into another estate, then we have the first privilege, ‘remission of sins.’ Look, as in the fall there was sin before guilt, so in our reparation there must be conversion, renovation, or repentance before remission. We are first effectually called or sanctified, and then justified and glorified. Man’s recovery to God is in the same method in which he fell from him. It is first brought about by a new nature, and communication of life from Christ. He regenerateth that he may pardon, and he pardoneth that he may further sanctify and make us everlastingly happy.

Thirdly, That remission of sins is a part, and a principal part of redemption.

1. How is it a part or fruit of redemption?

I answer—Redemption is taken either for the impetration or application.

[1.] The impetration or laying down the price, that was done by Christ upon the cross. So it is said, Heb. ix. 12, ‘Christ by his own blood obtained eternal redemption for us.’ Then was God propitiated, the deadly blow given to the kingdom and power of the devil, and the merit and ransom interposed, by the virtue of which we are pardoned. The obtained redemption and remission of sins is a fruit flowing from it, and depending upon it as an effect upon the cause.

SERMON II.

Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature.—Col. I. 15.

THE apostle having mentioned our redemption, doth now fall upon a description of the Redeemer. He is set forth by two things:—

First, His internal relation to God.

Secondly, By his external relation to the creature.

Doct. It is a great part of a believer’s work to have a deep sense of the Redeemer’s excellency imprinted upon his mind and heart.

Here I shall show:—

I. How it is set forth in this verse.

II. Why this should be much upon our minds and hearts.

I. How it is set forth in this scripture:—

1. That he is ‘the image of the invisible God.’

2. ‘The first-born of every creature.’

For the first expression there I shall consider:—

1. What belongs to an image.

2. In what respects Christ is the image of God.

3. How he differeth from other persons.

1. What belongeth to an image, and that all this is in Christ. In an image there are two things—impression and representation. Both are in Christ. There is a divine impression upon him, and he doth represent God to us.

[1.] For impression, there is:—

(1.) Likeness; for an image must be like him whom it representeth. An artificial image of God, or such as may be made by us, is forbidden upon this account: Isa. xl. 18, ‘To whom, then, will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto him?’ What is there among all the creatures that can be like such an infinite and almighty essence? or by what visible shape or figure would they represent or resemble God?

(2.) Deduction and derivation. The image is taken from him whom it is intended to represent. It is not some casual similitude between two men that have no reference or dependence one upon another; hut such as is between a father and his only-begotten son; as it is said of Adam, Gen. v. 1, ‘He begat a son in his own image;’ and so it is verified in Christ because of his eternal generation. Like him, because begotten of him.

(3.) There is not a likeness in a few things, but a complete and exact likeness; so Christ, as the second person, is called, Heb. i. 3, ‘The express image of his person.’ There is not only likeness, but equality. God cannot make a creature equal to himself, nor beget a son unequal to himself.

[2.] Representation; for an image it serveth to make known and declare that thing whose image it is. If light produce light, the light produced doth represent the light and glory producing; and the more perfect and immediate the production is, the more perfect is the resemblance; a lively expression of the pattern and exemplar. And this is the reason why the word invisible is added, because God, who in his own nature is invisible, and incomprehensible to man, revealeth himself so far as is necessary to salvation to us by Christ. Visible things are known by their visible images, with more delight, but not with more accuracy. The image is not necessary to know the thing; but here it is otherwise. We cannot know God but by Christ: John i. 18, ‘No man hath seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.’ God is invisible, and incomprehensible by any but Jesus Christ, who being his only Son, and one in essence with the Father, he doth perfectly know him, and reveal unto mankind all that they know of him. Thus you see what belongs to an image.

2. In what respects Christ is the image of God.

[1.] In respect of his eternal generation. So Christ is ‘the express image of his person’—not substance, but subsistence. We do not say that milk is like milk, nor one egg like another, because they are of the same substance; so Christ is not said to be of the same substance, but of the same subsistence. He is, indeed, of the same substance with him whom he doth resemble, but the image is with respect to the subsistence; so he resembleth the Father fully and perfectly. There is no perfection in the Father but the same is in the Son also. He is eternal, omnipotent, infinite in wisdom, goodness, and power.

[2.] As God incarnate, or manifested in our flesh; so the perfections of the Godhead shine forth in the man Christ Jesus, in his person, word, and works.

(1.) In his person. They that had a discerning eye might see something divine in Christ: John i. 14, ‘We beheld his glory, as the glory of the only-begotten of the Father.’ There is the as of similitude, and the as of congruity; as if a mean man taketh state upon him, we say he behaveth himself as a king, but if we say the same of a king indeed, we mean he behaveth himself king-like, that is, becoming the majesty of his high calling. So we beheld his glory as, &c., that is, such a glory as was suitable and becoming God’s only Son. So Christ was angry with his disciples because they were too importunate to see the Father, though they saw him ordinarily, conversing with him: John xiv. 7, ‘If ye had known me ye should have known my Father also, and from henceforth ye know him and have seen him.’ The Father is no otherwise to be known but as he hath revealed himself in Christ; and having seen and known Christ, who was his image, they might both see and know him; and when Philip saith ‘Show us the Father and it sufficeth us’—this will convince us all without further argument—Christ answereth, ver. 9, ‘He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.’ They might see the Father’s infinite power acting in him, his wisdom teaching by him, his goodness in the whole strain of his life; so that in Christ becoming man, God doth in and by him represent all his own attributes and properties, his wisdom, goodness, and power.

(2.) In his word; where God is revealed to us savingly, so as we may be brought into communion with him, so it is said, ‘lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them,’ 2 Cor. iv. 4. As God shineth forth in Christ, so doth Christ shine forth in the gospel. There we have the record of his doctrine, miracles, and the end for which he came into the world; and this is the great instrument by which the virtue and power of God is conveyed to us, for the changing of our hearts and lives: 2 Cor. iii. 18, ‘Beholding the glory of the Lord as in a glass, we are changed into his image and likeness, from glory to glory.’ Some sight of God we must have, or else we cannot be like him: the knowledge or sight of God with mortal or bodily eyes is impossible; the external manifestations and representations in the creature is imperfect, and sufficeth rather for conviction than conversion, or to leave us without excuse, than to save the soul, Rom. xii. 1 (they have not the excuse of fault less ignorance). To know him in the law, or covenant of works, doth but work wrath, Rom. iv. 15, or revive in us a stinging sense of our hopeless condition. To know him in person, or to see his glorious works, or hear his glorious words, was a privilege vouchsafed but to few, and to many that made no good use of it; therefore there is only reserved his word to bring us into communion with God, or the glass of the gospel to represent the glory of the Lord, that we may be changed into his likeness from glory to glory; there the knowledge of God is held out powerfully in order to our salvation.

(3.) His works—all which in their whole tenure and contexture showed him to be God-man. If at any time there appeared any evidence of human weakness, lest the world should be offended and stumble thereat, he did at the same time give out some notable demonstrations of his divine power. When he lay in a manger at his birth, a star appeared, and angels proclaimed his birth to the shepherds; when he was swaddled as an infant, the wise men came and worshipped him; when he was in danger of suffering shipwreck, he commanded the winds and the waves, and they obeyed him; when he was tempted by Satan, he was ministered unto by the angels, Mat. iv. 11; when they demanded tribute for the temple, a fish brought it to him, Mat. xvii. 26; when he was deceived in the fig-tree (which, was an infirmity of human ignorance), he suddenly blasted it, discovering the glory of a divine power; when he hung dying on the cross, the rocks were rent, the graves opened, the sun darkened, and all nature put into a rout. Though he humbled himself to purchase our mercies, yet he assured our faith by some emissions and breakings forth of his divine power. Well, then, though it be our duty to seek and find out God’s track and foot-print in the whole creation, and to observe the impressions of his wisdom, goodness, and power, in all the saints; especially this is our duty to admire his image in Jesus Christ, for in his humanity the perfections of the Godhead shine forth in the highest lustre. Whatever perfection we conceive to be in his person, word, or works, the same may we conclude to be in the Father also. Did the winds and seas obey Christ? the whole creation is at the beck of God. Did Christ show himself to be the wisdom, goodness and power of God? surely God is infinitely wise. Was Christ holy and undefiled? surely so is God—light in whom is no darkness at all. Was Christ loving, pitiful, and compassionate, not abhorring the most vile and miserable, whether in soul or body, that came to him for relief? surely God is love, and he will not be strange to those that seek him in Christ.

3. How he differeth from other persons; for the saints also are made after the image of God: Col. iii. 10, ‘And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him;’ Eph. iv. 24, ‘And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.’ I answer, There is a great difference between the image of God in man and the image of God in Christ.

[1.] Man resembleth God hut imperfectly. Man was made, and is now made, after the image of God, but with much abatement of this high perfection which is in Christ, for he hath all the substantial perfection which his Father hath. In other creatures there is some resemblance, but no equality: other creatures are made like God, but he is begotten like God.

[2.] It is derivative from Christ. God would recover man out of his lapsed estate by setting up a pattern of holiness in our nature: Rom. viii. 29, ‘Whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren.’ None was fit to restore this image of God that was lost, but God incarnate, for thereby the glory of God was again visible in our nature. God is a pure spirit, and we are creatures, that have indeed an immortal soul, but it dwelleth in flesh; therefore to make us like God, ‘the Word was made flesh,’ that he might represent the perfections of God to us, and commend holiness by his own example.

Secondly, The next thing ascribed to Christ is that he is ‘the first born of every creature:’ that is, born of God before any creature had a being, or begotten of the Father of his own proper essence, and equal with him before anything was created and brought forth out of nothing. But here the adversaries of the eternal Godhead of Christ triumph, and say, The first-born of the creatures is a creature, one of the same kind. I answer—If we grant this that they allege, they gain nothing, for Christ had two natures—he was God-man. As God, he is the Creator, and not a creature; for the apostle proveth that ‘by him all things were made:’ but as man, so he is indeed a creature. This double consideration must not be forgotten: Rom. i. 3, 4. Our Lord Jesus Christ was ‘made of the seed of David according to the flesh, but declared to be the Son of God, with power according to the Spirit;’ therefore we must distinguish between Christ and Christ, what he is according to the Spirit, and what he is according to the flesh.

2. I answer—That metaphors must be taken in the sense in which they are intended. Now what is the apostle’s intention in giving Christ the appellation of the first-born?

Four things are implied by this metaphor:—

[1.] Identity of nature.

[2.] Likeness of original.

[3.] Antiquity.

[4.] Dignity.

Nothing else can be insinuated into the mind of man by such a form of speech but identity and sameness of nature between the brethren, which is true as to Christ’s humanity: Heb. ii. 14, ‘Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also took part of the same;’ or else sameness of stock, which is true also, for the same reason: Heb. ii. 11, ‘For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren;’ or priority of time, for the first-born is before all the rest; or else dignity, authority, and pre-eminence. Now, which of these doth the apostle intend? The two last the pre-existence of Christ before anything was made, as appeareth by this reason, ver. 16, ‘For by him all things were made, whether they be in heaven or in earth;’ and also his dignity and authority above them, as appeareth by the frequent use of the word. For the first-born in families had authority over the rest. When Jacob had got the birthright, this was a part of Isaac’s blessing: Gen. xxvii. 29, ‘Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee: be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother’s sons bow down to thee.’ Sovereignty was implied in the birthright, so David is called ‘the first-born of the kings of the earth,’ Ps. lxxxix. 27, as the most glorious amongst them. So here nothing else is intended but that Christ is in time and dignity before all creatures.

Thirdly, Though Christ be called the first-born of every creature, it doth not imply that he is to be reckoned as one of them, or accounted a creature. It is true, when it is said, Rom. viii. 29, that ‘he is the first-born among many brethren,’ it implieth that he is head of the renewed estate, that he and all new creatures are of the same kind—allowing him the dignity of his rank and degree; for God is his God, and their God his Father and their Father. But here it is not the first-born amongst the creatures, but the first-born of every creature. And for further confirmation, here is not identity of nature, for he is not at all of the same nature with the angels—those principalities and thrones, dominions and powers, spoken of in the next verse—nor issued of the same stock with any of them. Mark, he is called the first-born, not first created, which must be understood of his divine nature and eternal generation of the Father before all creatures. The creatures are not begotten and born of God, but made by him. So Christ is primogenitus—that is, unigenitus, the first-born, that only-begotten. In the following verse he is brought in, not as a creature, but the creator of all things. The first-born is not the cause of the rest of the children. Peter was the first-born, yet may be a brother to James and John, but not a father to them. Now all the rest of the creatures are created and produced by him; he is not reckoned among them as one of them—he is the image of the invisible God.

II. Why this excellency of our Redeemer should be so deeply impressed upon our minds and hearts? For many reasons.

1. This is needful to show his sufficiency to redeem the world. The party offended is God, who is of infinite majesty; the favour to be purchased is the everlasting fruition of God; and the sentence to be reversed is the sentence of everlasting punishment. Therefore there needed some valuable satisfaction to be given to reconcile these things to our thoughts; that we may be confident that we shall have redemption by his blood, even the remission of sins. There are three things that commend the value of Christ’s sacrifice—the dignity of his person, the greatness of his sufferings, and the merit of his obedience. But the two latter without the former will little quiet the heart of scrupulous men. His sufferings were great, but temporary and finite—the merit of his obedience much; but how shall the virtue of it reach all the world? And if he be but a mere creature, he hath done what he ought to do. I confess a fourth thing may be added—God’s institution, which availeth to the end for which God hath appointed it; but the scripture insists most on the first—the dignity of his person—which putteth a value on his sacrifice: Acts xx. 18; Heb. ix. 13, 14; at least there is an intrinsic worth. This answers all objections. His sufferings were temporary and finite; but it is the blood of God,—he hath offered up himself through the eternal Spirit.

2. To work upon our love, that Christ may have the chief room in our hearts. There is no such argument to work upon our love as that God over all, blessed for ever, should come to relieve man in such a condescending way: 1 John iii. 16, ‘Hereby we perceive the love which God hath to us, in that he laid down his life for us: ‘that very person that died for us was God. There was power discovered in the creation, when God made us like himself out of the dust of the ground; but love in our redemption, when he made himself like us. The person that was to work out our deliverance was the eternal Son of God. That God that owes nothing to man, and was so much offended by man, and that stood in no need of man, having infinite happiness and contentment in himself, that he should come and die for us! Hereby perceive we the love of God. When we consider what Christ is, we shall most admire what he hath done for us.

Thirdly, That we may give Christ his due honour; for God will have all men to honour the Son as they honour the Father, John v. 23, he being equal in power and glory. The setting forth of his glory is a rent due to him from all creatures. We are to praise him both in word and deed, in mind, and heart, and practice, which we can never do unless we understand the dignity of his person. We are apt to have low thoughts of Christ, therefore we should often revive the considerations that may represent his worth and excellency.

Fourthly, That we may place all hope of salvation in him, and may make use of him to the ends which he came to accomplish. We can hardly consider the work of redemption but some base thoughts arise in our minds, nor entertain this mystery, with due respect to the truth, and greatness, and admirableness of it, without raising our thoughts to the consideration of the dignity of the person who is to accomplish it: Heb. iii. 1, ‘Therefore, brethren, consider the Lord Jesus, the great high priest and apostle of our profession.’

Fifthly, That we may the better understand two things:—

1. The humiliation of the Son of God.

2. The way how we may recover the lost image of God.

1. The humiliation of the Son of God. Certainly, he that came to redeem us was the brightness of his Father’s glory and the express image of his person. Now, how did he humble himself? Was he not still the image of God in our nature? Yes, but the divine glory and majesty was hidden under the veil of our flesh: little of it did appear, and that only to those who narrowly did observe him; the brightness of his glory did not conspicuously shine forth. Was this all? No; his dignity was lessened; there was capitis diminutio, the lessening of a man’s estate or condition,—as of a man degraded from the senatorian order to the degree of knight, thence to the plebeian. Thus was the eternal Son of God lessened, less than God, as mediator: John xiv. 28, ‘My Father is greater than I.’ As God incarnate he took an office designed to him by God, and obeyed him in all things. They were one in essence, John x. 30; yet with respect to his office to save souls, he was lessened. Nay, not only less than God, but lesser than the angels: Heb. ii. 7, ‘He was made a little lower than the angels.’ Not born so, but made so. Man is inferior to an angel as a man in the rank and order of beings; the angels die not: therefore his incarnation and liableness to death is a great lessening of his dignity; so not in respect of office only, but human nature assumed.

2. It showeth us how the image of God may be recovered; if we be changed into the likeness of Christ, for he is the image of God. His merit should not only be precious to us, but his example. It is a great advantage not only to have a rule but an example; because man is so prone to imitate, that an example in our nature maketh it the more operative. His excuse is ready at hand: we are flesh and blood—what would you have us do? Therefore Christ came incarnate to be an example of holiness. He had the interests of flesh and blood to mind as well as we; and so would show that a holy life is possible to those that are renewed by his grace. He obeyed God in our nature; therefore in the same nature we may obey, please, and glorify God, though still in a self-denying manner. The foundation of it is laid in the new birth. The Spirit that formed Christ out of the substance of the Virgin, the same Spirit is ready to form Christ in you. He maketh new creatures; so that there is not only Christ’s example, but Christ’s power.

Use 1. Then let the excellency and dignity of Christ’s person be more upon your minds and hearts; think often of those two notions in the text—that he is the image of the invisible God, that therein you may be like him. You cannot be the image of God so as he was, but you must be in your measure. ‘The fulness of the Godhead dwelt in him bodily,’ but you must be ‘partakers of the divine nature.’ He showed himself to be the Son of God by his works, when the Jews said he blasphemed when he said he was the Son of God: John x. 27, ‘If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not.’ He allowed them to doubt of them, if he did not those works which were proper to one sent from God. Certainly this is the glory of man, to be the image of God; there is no greater perfection than to live in the nearest resemblance to his Creator. Christ is more excellent, because he hath more of the image of God upon him.

2. Consider, again, that he is Lord of the whole creation, and therefore called ‘the first-born of every creature.’ Well, then, we should be subject to him, and with greater diligence apply ourselves to the obedience of his holy laws, and use the means appointed by him to obtain the blessedness offered to us. There is in us a natural sentiment of the authority of God, and we have a dread upon our hearts if we do what he hath forbidden; but we have not so deep a sense of the authority of Christ, and play fast and loose with religion, as fancy and humour and interest lead us. Now, from this argument, you see we should honour the Son as we honour the Father, and be as tender of his institutions as we are of the commandments evident by natural light; for he is not only the messenger of God, but his express image, and the first-born of every creature. Not to believe him, and obey him, and love him, is to sin, not only against our duty, but our remedy and the law of our recovery.

SERMON III.

For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him.—Col. I. 16.

THE apostle had told us in the former verse that Jesus Christ is the first-born of every creature. The Arians thence concluded that he himself was created out of nothing in order of time before the world. But it is not ‘the first created of any creature.’ but ‘the first-born.’ which noteth a precedency, not only in point of antiquity, but dignity; and is as much as to say, Lord of every creature. For the first-born was the lord of the rest, and the title may be given either relatively or comparatively.

1. Relatively; when the rest are of the same stock, or have the relation of brethren to him that hath the pre-eminence. So it is given to Christ with respect to new creatures: Rom. viii. 29, ‘That he might be the first-born among many brethren.’

2. Comparatively only; when several persons or things be compared, though there be no relation between them. So David is called ‘the first-born of the kings of the earth.’ Ps. lxxxix. 27—that is, superior in dignity and honour. So here it is taken not relatively, for so Christ is primogenitus, the first-born, that he is also unigenitus, the only-begotten. None went before, or come after him, that are so begotten of God. What he asserteth in that verse, he now proveth by the creation of all things, in ver. 16, and the conservation of all things, ver. 17. We are now upon the first proof. Surely he that created all things is supreme lord of all things, or hath the right of the first-born over them. Two ways is Christ said to have a right to the creatures: as God, and as mediator. His right as God is natural and perpetual; his right as mediator is by grant and donation. It is a power acquired and obtained. His natural right is antecedent to his actual susception of the office of mediator; for it comes to him by creation. He made all, and it is fit that he should be sovereign and lord of all. But the other power and sovereignty is granted to him as a part of his reward and recompense for the sorrows of his humiliation: Phil. ii. 9, 10, ‘Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.’ The apostle speaks not of this latter now, but of the former—his right as the only-begotten Son of God: he is the first-born, that is, Lord of the whole creation. And good reason, ‘for by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth,’ &c. In the words, the creation of the world is ascribed to Christ. Take notice—

1. Of the object of this creation.

2. Christ’s efficiency about it.

1. The object of creation is spoken collectively and distributively.

[1.] Collectively: ‘By him were all things created.’

[2.] Distributively: They are many ways distinguished.

(1.) By their place: ‘Things in heaven, and things in earth.’

(2.) By their nature: ‘Things visible and invisible.’

(3.) By their dignity and office: ‘Thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers’—words often used in scripture to signify the angels, whether good or bad. The good angels: Eph. i. 21, ‘Far above all principality and power, and might and dominion;’ Eph. iii. 10, ‘That unto principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God.’ Sometimes this term is given to the bad angels: ‘We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers,’ Eph. vi. 12; and Rom. viii. 38, ‘Nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers.’ So that the meaning is, the angelical creatures, together with their degree and dignity, as well among themselves as over the lower world; of what rank and degree soever they are, they are all created by him. He insisteth more on them than on the other branches, because some cried up the dignity of the angels, to the lessening of the honour and office of Christ, and because they were the noblest and most powerful creatures. And if the most glorious creatures were created by him, surely all others had their being and life from him. Well, then, there is a gradation notable in setting forth the object of the creation. Christ made not only things in earth but things in heaven; not only the visible things of heaven, the sun, moon, and stars, but the invisible, the angels—not the lower sort of angels only, but the most noble and the most potent—thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers.

2. Christ’s efficiency about them; in these words, they were c created by him, and for him.’

[1.] By him; as an equal. co-operating cause, or co-worker with God the Father: John v. 19, ‘Whatsoever things the Father doeth, those doeth the Son likewise.’ To bring a thing out of nothing belongeth unto God. The distance of the terms is infinite; so must the agent be. Creation is an act of divine power.

[2.] They are for him: they are by him as their first cause; they are for him as their last end. God is often represented in scripture as first and last: Isa. xli. 4, ‘I the Lord, the first and the last, I am he;’ Isa. xliv. 6, ‘I am the first and the last; there is no God besides me;’ so Isa. xlviii. 2, ‘I am the first; I am also the last.’ Now all this is repeated and applied to Christ: Rev. i. 17, ‘He said unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last; I have the keys of death and hell;’ Rev. ii. 8, ‘These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive;’ Rev. xxii. 13, ‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.’ Now these expressions do imply his eternal power and Godhead. He hath been before all things were made, and shall be when all things in the world are ended. He is the first being from whom all things are, and the last end to whom all things are to be referred. He is the efficient and final cause of all the creatures.

Doct. That all creatures, angels not excepted, owe their very being to Christ, the Son of God, our blessed and glorious Redeemer.

I shall take the method offered in the text, and show you:—

First, That all things were created by him.

Secondly, Why the creation of angels is so particularly mentioned and insisted upon.

Thirdly, That all things were created for him.

First, For creation by him. This is often asserted in scripture: John i. 3, ‘All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made.’ John begins his Gospel with the dignity of Christ’s person; and how doth he set it forth? By the creation of the world by the eternal Word. And what he saith is an answer to these questions—When was the Word? ‘In the beginning;’ Where was the Word? ‘With God;’ What was the Word? He ‘was God;’ What did he then do? ‘All things were made by him;’ What! all without exception? Yes, ‘Without him nothing was made that was made.’ be it never so small, never so great. From the highest angel to the smallest worm, they had all their being from him. Two things are to be explained:—

1. How he made all things.

2. When he made the angels.

1. How he made all things. Freely, and of his own will: Rev. iv. 11, ‘Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive honour, and glory, and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.’ They use three words to set forth the honour that is due to Christ for creating the world: glory, because of his excellencies discovered; honour, which is the ascription or acknowledgment of those, excellencies; and power, because ‘the invisible things of his Godhead and power are seen by the things that are made,’ Rom. i. 20. For in the creating of the world he exercised his omnipotency. And this they do, not to express their affection, but his own due desert: ‘Thou art worthy, O Lord.’ The reason they give is, because he hath created all things for his own pleasure, or according to his own will—not out of necessity. There was no tie upon him to make them, but only he of his good pleasure thought fit to do so. He might have done it in another manner, or at another time, or in another order. There is nothing in the world that hath a necessary connexion with the divine essence, so as, if God be, that must be; nothing external cometh from God by necessity of nature, but all is done according to the counsel of his own will. Some thought all created things did come forth from the Creator by way of emanation, as rivers flow out of their fountain; but there is no stream floweth out of any fountain but it was before a part of that fountain while it was in it. But that cannot be said of any creature in respect of God, that it was any part of God before it came out from him. Others say the creatures came out from God by way of representation, as an image in the glass from him that passeth by or looketh on it; but before the world was made there was no such glass to represent God. Others would express it thus—that the world cometh out from God as a shadow from the body. But yet this will not fit the turn neither: for the shadow doth not come out from the body, but follows it, because of the deprivation of light from the interposition of another body. Others say—all cometh from God as a footprint, or track in clay or sand, from one that passeth over it; but there was nothing on which God, by passing, might make such an impression. Whatever good intention they might have by setting forth the creation by these expressions, yet you see they are not proper and accurate. These expressions may have their use to raise man’s understanding to contemplate the excellency and majesty of the Creator; for they all show his incomparable excellency and perfection, together with the vanity, nothingness, or smallness of the creature if compared with him, as great a bulk as it beareth in our eye. They are but as a ray from the sun, a stream from the fountain, or a drop to the ocean; an image in the glass, or a shadow to the substance; or like a footprint of a man in the clay or sand; and so are but certain signs leading up to the thing signified, or letters and syllables out of which we may spell God—as the streams lead us to the fountain, the image to the man, the shadow to the body, or the track to the foot that made it. But the scripture, leaving those comparisons, showeth us that the world came out from the Creator as .the workmanship from the artificer, the building from the architect, Heb. xi. 10. Now every artificer and builder worketh merely out of the counsel of his own will. And herein they resemble God; but only what they do with great labour, God doth with the beck of his own will and word: Ps. xxxiii. 6, ‘By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.’ A bare word of his immediately created all the world, the heavens and earth, and all that is in them.

2. When did he make the angels? for in the history of Moses there seemeth to be a great silence of it.

I answer—We read, Gen. i. 1, that in the beginning—that is, when God did first set himself to create—that then he created the heaven and the earth; but we read again in the 20th verse, ‘That in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is.’ I argue, that if within that compass of time, the Lord made heaven and earth, and all things that are in them, angels are included in that number, being the inhabitants of heaven, as men and beasts are of the earth, and fishes of the sea; as here, by things in heaven, the apostle principally understands the angels, and by things on earth, men. Therefore, as things on earth were not made but after the earth, so things in heaven were not created but after the heavens were created. The heavens were not created till the second day, nor perfected and fitted till the fourth. Therefore, as God did furnish the earth with plants and beasts before men, so did he adorn the heaven with stars before he filled it with angels; for he first framed the house and adorned it before he brought in the inhabitants. Therefore, probably they were made the fourth day. If this seemeth too short a time before the fall of the apostate angels, you must remember how soon man degenerated. Some think he did not sleep in innocency, quoting that Ps. xlix. 12, ‘Man being in honour abides not, but is like the beasts that perish.’ The word signifies a night’s lodging in an inn—shall not lodge or stay a night. Others make his fall on the next day, the Sabbath, for at the end of the sixth day all was good, very good. The angels fell from their first state as soon as they were created—so short and uncertain is all created glory.

Secondly, All things were created for him—that is, for the honour of the Son, as well as for the honour of the Father and the Holy Ghost. Now this is necessary to be thought of by us, because there is a justice in the case that we should return and employ all in his service from whom we have received all, even though it be with the denial of our nearest and dearest interest. He is worthy of this glory and honour from us, and that we should trust upon him as a faithful Creator in the midst of all dangers.

1. I will prove that the greatest glory the creature is capable of is to serve the will and set forth the praise of its Creator, for everything that attaineth not its end is vain. What matter is it whether I be a dog, or a man, a beast, or an angel, if I serve not the end for which I was made? And that is not the personal and particular benefit of any creature, but the glory of the Creator, for God made all things for himself, Prov. xvi. 4; whether he made beasts, or man, or angels, it was still with a respect to his own glory and service. God is independent and self-sufficient of himself and for himself. Self-seeking in the creature is monstrous and incongruous. It is as absurd and un beseeming to seek its own glory as to attribute to itself its own being: Rom. xi. 36, ‘Of him, and through him, and to him are all things.’ God’s glory is the end of our being and doing, for being and doing are both from him, and therefore for him alone. Above all, it concerneth man to consider this: who can glorify God not only objectively by the impressions of God upon him, and passively, as God will over rule all his actions to his own glory, but actively, as he is the mouth of the creation—not only to honour God himself, but to give him the praise which resulteth from all his works. It was well said of a heathen, Si essem luscinia—if I were a nightingale I would sing as a nightingale; Si alauda—if I were a lark I would pere as a lark. When I am a man what should I do but know, love, and praise God without ceasing, and glorify my Creator? Things are unprofitable or misplaced when they do not seek or serve their end; therefore for what use are we meet, who are so unmeet for our proper end? Like the wood of the vine that is good for nothing, not so much as to make a pin whereon to hang anything, Ezek. xv. 2—good for nothing but to be cast into the fire unless it be fruitful. What are we good for if we be not serviceable to the ends for which we were created?

2. The design of God was that the whole creation should be put in subjection to the Word incarnate—not only this lower world, wherein man is concerned, but the upper world also. Our Redeemer, who hath bought us, hath an interest in all things that may concern us, that they may be disposed of to his own glory and our good and advantage. All are at the making and at the disposal of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore it is said, Heb. ii. 10, ‘For whom are all things, and by whom are all things.’ God that frameth all things ordereth all things to their proper end. His works are many, and some are more excel lent and glorious than others; and one of the chief of them is the salvation of man by Jesus Christ. Therefore all things are subordinated thereunto, to the glory of the Mediator by whom this is accomplished: 1 Cor. viii. 6, ‘But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.’

Secondly, Why the creation of angels is so particularly and expressly mentioned? I answer—For three reasons:—

1. To show the glory and majesty of the Redeemer. The angels are said to ‘excel in strength,’ Ps. ciii. 20, and elsewhere they are called ‘mighty angels.’ This potency they have from their Creator, who giveth power and strength to all his creatures as it pleases him. Their strength may be conceived by that instance, that one angel in a night slew one hundred and eighty-five thousand in Sennacherib’s camp. Now, these potent creatures are infinitely inferior to our Redeemer, by whom and for whom they were made. Though they are the most excellent of all the creatures, yet they are his subjects and ministers, at his beck and command, both by the law of their creation, as Christ is God, and also by the Father’s donation, as he is Mediator and God incarnate: 1 Pet. iii. 25, ‘He is set down on the right hand of God; angels, authorities, and powers being made subject to him.’ And again, Eph. i. 21, ‘He hath set him far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but in that which is to come.’ They have a great name, but Christ hath ‘a more excellent name than they,’ Heb. i. 4, for they are all bound to worship him, ver. 6, and serve him, for he employeth them for the defence and comfort of the meanest of his people. They are subject not only to God, but to Christ, or God incarnate. Look, as it is the glory of earthly kings to command mighty and powerful subjects—(‘Are not my princes altogether kings?’ Isa. x. 8, that so many princes held under him as their sovereign and served him as their commander; and when God speaks of the Assyrian he calleth him ‘a king of princes,’ Hosea viii. 10, namely, as he had many kings subject and tributary to him)—so is this the majesty of our Redeemer, that he hath these powerful creatures, the mighty angels, in his train and retinue. These heavenly hosts make up a part of that army which is commanded by the Captain of our salvation.

2. This is mentioned to obviate the errors of that age. Both the Jews and the Gentiles had a high opinion of spirits and angels, as God’s ministers and messengers: for he doth not always immediately administer the affairs of mankind. Now, as they were right in the main as to their service, so they added much of curiosity and superstition to the doctrine of angels, and by their vain speculations infected the minds of many in the Christian church, who were but newly come out from among them, insomuch that they fell to the worshipping of angels as mediators to God; as the apostle intimateth, Col. ii. 18. Now, because this was to the disparagement of Christ, the apostles did set themselves to check this curiosity of dogmatising about angels, and the superstition or idolatry of angel-worship thence growing apace. Now this they did by asserting the dignity of Christ’s person and office. As Paul, Col. ii., and the author to the Hebrews, chapters i., ii., iii., ‘Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds, who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.’ It is true, Christ was sent from heaven as the angels are, and he came in a despicable way of appearance to promote our salvation and recovery, as they assumed bodies suitable to their message; yet his superiority and pre-eminence above the angels is clear and manifest. He was not only equal to them, but far above them, Heb. i. 3. Seven things are observable in that verse:—

(1.) Christ came as the eternal Son of God: ‘He hath spoken unto us by his Son.’ When he cometh to the angels, he saith, they are servants and ministering spirits. For a short while he ministered in the form of a servant in the days of his flesh—they continue to be so from the beginning to the end of the world.

(2.) He was heir of all things—that is, Lord of the whole creation—they only principalities and powers, for certain ends, to such persons and places, over which Christ sets them.

(3.) He was the Creator of the world. ‘By whom also he made the worlds,’ saith the apostle. They are noble and divine creatures indeed, but the work of Christ’s hands.

(4.) He is ‘the brightness of his Father’s glory, and the express image of his person’—that is, the essential image of God; they only have some strictures of the divine majesty.

(5.) The ‘upholding all things by the word of his power’—that is, the conserving cause of all that life and being that is in the creature. The angels live in a continual dependence upon Christ as their creator, and without his supporting influence, would be soon annihilated.

(6.) By himself he ‘purged our sins.’ He was sent into the world for that great and glorious work of mediation, which none of them was worthy to undertake, none able to go through withal, but himself alone. They are sent about the ordinary concernments of the saints, or the particular affairs of the world: he is the author of the whole work of redemption and salvation, and they but subordinate assistants in the particular promotion of it.’

(7.) He ‘sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;’ they are spirits near the throne of God, ever in his presence, attending on him like princes. God never made any of them universal and eternal king, for he set Christ at his right hand, not the angels. To sit at God’s right hand, is not only to be blessed and happy in enjoying those pleasures which are there for evermore, not only to be advanced to the highest place of dignity and honour next to God, but to be invested with a supreme and universal power above all men and angels. Take these, or any one of these, and he is above the angels, though they be the most noble and excellent creatures that ever God made.

3. Because Christ hath a ministry and service to do by them. He makes use of them partly to exercise their obedience, without which they forsake the law of their creation and swerve from the end for which they were made: Ps. ciii. 20, ‘They do his commandments, hearkening to the voice of his word.’ They do whatsoever he commandeth them, with all readiness and speed imaginable, and therein they are^an example to us: Mat. vi. 10, ‘Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.’ They are our fellow-servants now in the work, hereafter in the recompense, when we are admitted into one society, under one common head and Lord, Heb. xii. 27, who shall for ever rejoice in the contemplation of God’s infinite excellencies. Well, then, if these excellent creatures, so great in power, be always so ready and watchful to do the will of God, and count it their honour to assist in so glorious a work as the saving of souls, or do any other business he sendeth them about, how should we, that hope to be like the angels in happiness, be like them in obedience also!

2. Because the church’s safety dependeth upon it. We stand in need of this ministry of angels. The service of the angels is protection to the people of God—vengeance on their enemies.

(1.) For protection. Christ hath the heavenly host at his command, and sendeth them forth for the good of his people: Ps. lxviii. 17, ‘The chariots of the Lord are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels: the Lord is among them in Sinai in the holy place.’ Mark, that thousands of angels are his chariots, conveying him from heaven to earth, and from earth to heaven; and mark, the Lord is among them—that is, God incarnate—for he presently speaketh of his ascending up on high. ‘Thou hast ascended up on high, and led captivity captive; thou hast received gifts for men,’ ver. 18. Among them in his holy place that is, in heaven. It is added, as in Mount Sinai—that is, as at the giving of the law. They were then there, and still attend on the propagation of the gospel. For more particular cases, see Heb. i. 14, ‘Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?’ So Ps. xxxiv. 7, ‘The angel of the Lord eucampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them.’ All that obediently serve and wait on God have the promise of this protection.

(2.) The other part of this ministry and service is to restrain and destroy the devil and his instruments. The scripture often speaks of God’s executing judgments by the angels. Their influence doth not always personally appear, yet it is great and powerful. Though the powers and authorities on earth, and their messengers and forces, be often employed against the saints, yet the Captain of our salvation is in heaven, and all the mighty angels are subject to him, and at his disposal. By this means the prophet Elisha confirmed himself and his servant, when the king of Syria sent chariots and horses, a great host, to attack him in Dothan: 2 King vi. 14, 15, ‘And when his servant saw it early in the morning, he said, Alas, my master! what shall we do?’ The prophet answered, ver. 16, ‘They that be with us are more than they that be against us.’ And then, ver. 17, he prayed, ‘Lord, open his eyes that he may see; and the Lord opened .his eyes, and behold the mountain was full of chariots and horses of fire, round about Elisha.’ These fiery horses and chariots were nothing else but the angels of God. Here is force against force, chariots against chariots, horse against horse, if we could open the eye of faith and shut that of sense. We read, Acts xii. 23, that an angel smote Herod in the midst of his pride and persecution: the angel of the Lord smote him.

Use 1. Let us more deeply be possessed with the majesty of our Redeemer. He is the Creator of all things, of angels as well as men, and so more excellent than all the men in the world, whether they excel in power or holiness, which the psalmist expresseth thus: ‘Fairer than the children of men,’ Ps. xlv. 29. But also, then, the most excellent and glorious angels; he is their creator as well as ours, head of principalities and powers, as well as of poor worms here upon earth. Surely the representing and apprehending of Christ in his glorious majesty is a point of great consequence.

1. Partly to give us matter for praise and admiration, that we may not have mean thoughts of his person and office. He is a most glorious Lord and King, that holdeth the most powerful creatures in subjection to himself. If Christians did know and consider how much of true religion consists in admiring and praising their Redeemer, they would more busy their minds in this work.

2. Partly to strengthen our trust, and to fortify us against all fears and discouragements in our service. When we think of the great Creator of heaven and earth, and all things visible and invisible, angels, men, principalities, &c., surely the brightness of all creature glory should wax dim in our eyes: ‘Our God is able to deliver us,’ Dan. iii. 18, and will, as he did by his angel. This was that which fortified Stephen: Acts v. 55, 56, ‘He saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God.’ It is easy for him who made all things out of nothing to help us. See Ps. cxxi. 2, ‘My help standeth in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.’ The Almighty Creator, ruler, and governor of the world, what cannot he do? As long as I see those glorious monuments of his power standing, I will not distrust he can afford me seasonable help by his holy angels, through the intercession of his Son, who hath assumed my nature.

3. Partly to bind our duty. All creatures were made by him and for him; therefore we should give up ourselves to him, and say with Paul, Acts xxvii. 23, ‘His I am, and him I serve.’ His by creation and redemption, therefore everything we have and do ought to have a respect to his glory and service. There is a variety of creatures in the world, of different kinds and different excellencies. In the whole and every kind there is somewhat of the glory of God and Christ set forth. Now this should strike our hearts—Shall we only, who are the persons most obliged, be a disgrace to our Lord, both Creator and Redeemer, when the good angels are so ready to attend him at his beck and command, and that in the meanest services and ministries? Shall poor worms make bold with his laws, slight his doctrine, despise his benefits? Heb. ii. 2, 3, ‘If the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?’

4. And lastly, to make us more reverent in our approaches to him; for he sits in the assembly of the gods, the holy angels are round about him: Ps. cxxxviii. 1, ‘Before the gods will I sing praise to thee’—that is, in the presence of the holy angels: 1 Cor. x. 10; Eccles. v. 6, ‘Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin, neither say thou before the angel that it was an error.’ The angels in heaven observe our behaviour in God’s worship—what vows we make to God, what promises of obedience. But, above all, there is our glorious Redeemer himself: Heb. xii. 28, 29, with what reverence and godly fear should we approach his holy presence!

Use 2. Is to quicken us to thankfulness for our redemption; that our creator is our Redeemer. None of the angels did humble himself as Christ did do, to do so great a piece of service, and yet he is far above them. There is a congruity in it, that we should be restored by him by whom we were made; but he made the angels as well as men, but he did not restore them. No; they were not so much as in a condition of forbearance and respite; he assumed not their nature, he created all things, but he redeemed mankind. His delights were with the sons of men; he assumed our nature, and for a while ‘was made a little lower than the angels,’ Heb. ii. 9. We cannot sufficiently bless God for the honour done to our nature in the person of Christ, for it is God incarnate that is made head of angels, principalities, and powers—God in our nature, whom all the angels are called upon to adore and worship. The devil sought to dishonour God, as if he were envious of man’s happiness: Gen. iii. 5, ‘God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof ye shall be as gods.’ And he sought to depress the nature of man, which in innocency stood so near to God. Now, that his human nature should be set so far above the angelical, in the person of Christ, and be admitted to dwell with God in a personal union, this calleth for our highest love and thankfulness.

Use 3. Is an encouragement to come to Christ for sanctifying and renewing grace. I have three arguments:—

1. The person to whom we come. To whom should we come but to our Creator, God infinitely good, wise, and powerful? The creation showeth him good, and whatever is good in the creatures is wholly derived from his goodness. It is but like the odour of the sweet ointments, or the perfume that he leaveth behind him where he hath been, James i. 19. He is infinitely wise. When he created and settled the world, he did not jumble things in a chaos and confusion, but settled them in a most perfect order and proportion, which may be seen, not only in the fabric of the world, but in the disposition of the parts of man’s body, yea, or in any gnat or fly. Now cannot he put our disordered souls in frame again? If the fear of God be true wisdom, to whom should we seek for it but from the wise God? His infinite power is seen also in the creation, in raising all things out of nothing. And if a divine power be necessary to our conversion, to whom should we go but to him who calleth the things that are not as though they were? Rom. iv. 17; ‘According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness,’ 2 Pet. i. 7.

2. From the work itself, which is a new creation, which carrieth much resemblance with the old: Eph. ii. 10, ‘For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works;’ 2 Cor. iv. 6, ‘For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined into our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.’ It is such an effect as comes from a being of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness, that man may be in a capacity to love, please, and serve God. What was lost in Adam can only be recovered by Christ.

3. From the relation of the party that seeketh it: Ps. cxix. 73, ‘Thine hands have made me and fashioned me; give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments.’ We go to him as his own creatures. This plea hath great force because of God’s goodness to all his creatures. (1.) Not only the angels, but every worm and fly had their being from Christ; there is a great variety of living things in the world, but they are all fed from the common fountain; therefore we may comfortably come to him for life and quickening, John i. 4. We need not be discouraged by our baseness and vileness, for the basest worm had what it hath from him. (2.) That Christ, as Creator, beareth such affection to man as the work of his hands: ‘Is it good unto thee that thou shouldst despise the work of thy hands?’ Job x. 3. Artificers, when they have made an excellent work, are very chary of it, and will not destroy it and break it in pieces: Job xiv. 15, ‘Thou wilt have a desire to the work of thine hands.’ As creatures beg relief and help; if you cannot plead the covenant of Abraham, plead the covenant of Noah. (3.) God forsakes none of the fallen creatures but those that forsake him first: 2 Chron. xv. 2, ‘The Lord is with you while you be with him, and if ye seek him he will be found of you, but if ye forsake him he will forsake you;’ 1 Chron. xxviii. 9, ‘If thou seek him he will be found of thee, but if thou forsake him he will cast thee off for ever.’ (4.) Especially will Christ be good to man seeking after him for grace, that we may serve and obey him. For he is no Pharaoh, to require brick and give no straw. Creating grace laid the debt upon us, and his redeeming grace provideth the power and help, that we may discharge it. Now, when we acknowledge the debt and confess our impotency to pay it, and our willingness to return to our duty, will Christ fail us? A conscience of our duty is a great matter, but a desire of grace to perform it is more. Therefore, come as creatures earnestly desiring to do their Creator’s will, and to promote his glory. God will not refuse the soul that lieth so submissively at his feet.

SERMON IV.

And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.—Col. I. 17.

THE apostle had asserted the dignity of Christ’s person by ascribing the work of creation to him: now the work of conservation and providence. By the same divine power by which Christ made all things he doth preserve and sustain all things.

In this verse two things are ascribed to Christ:—

First, His precedency in point of time, or his antiquity before all creatures: and he is before all things—that is, he had an eternal being before anything that now is created.

Secondly, His sustaining all things by his almighty power: and by him all things do consist. All creatures owe their continuance and preservation to him.

The first point is his precedency and pre-existence before all creatures whatsoever.

Doct. That Jesus Christ had a being before any of the creatures were made.

1. That he had a being long before he was born of the Virgin, for he was in the time of the patriarchs, as John viii. 48, ‘Before Abraham was, I am;’ to say nothing of that godlike way of speaking—I am; not I was, but I am; that which I now plead for is, that he was before Abraham. The words are occasioned by Christ saying that Abraham saw his day and was glad, which the Jews understood not of a prophetical but of a real vision, and therefore objected the impossibility that he was not yet fifty years old, and how could he see Abraham, or Abraham see him? Christ doth not answer to their ill interpretation, but showeth that their very objection contained no absurdity if taken in their own sense, for he was not only in the time of Abraham, but long before, and so affirmeth more than that objection required. The Jews thought it absurd that Christ should be in the time of Abraham, but Christ affirmeth more, and that with a strong asseveration. He was not only by the constitution of God, but really existing before Abraham, for the predestination not only of Christ but of Abraham, and all the elect, was before the foundation of the world. If, in respect of special prediction, mark then what must follow. Then Cyrus must be in the time of Isaiah, Josiah must be in the time of Jeroboam, the calling of the Gentiles must be in the time of Moses, for they prophesied of these things.

2. That he had a being at the time of the creation, that is also clear; for it is said, ‘In the beginning was the Word.’ John i. 1—that is, when Christ set himself to create all things. The word beginning, signifies many things, but chiefly the beginning of all time, especially when it is put absolutely, without any limitation to the matter in hand. So John viii. 44, ‘The devil was a murderer from the beginning ‘that is, almost as soon as created; Mat. xix. 4, ‘He that made them at the beginning, made them male and female.’ So Heb. i. 10, ‘And thou in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the earth;’ and in many other places. Therefore Christ had a being when the world and all creatures were made, visible and invisible. So Prov. viii. 22-31, ‘The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth: while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world. When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth: when he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep: when he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the foundations of the earth: then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him; rejoicing in the habit able parts of his earth; and my delights were with the sons of men.’ There the Wisdom of God, or the eternal Word, describeth the antiquity of his person. All the question is, what this Wisdom is that is there spoken of?

(1.) It is not human, but divine; for the Wisdom there spoken of was before the world was.

(2.) Whatever it be, it is not a divine attribute, but a divine person; for those things which are there ascribed to Wisdom cannot properly belong to an attribute, to be begotten, brought forth, ver. 23, 24. to have the affections of love, ver. 27, delight, ver. 31. All along the expressions agree only to a person. That Wisdom which inviteth sinners, promises the Spirit, threatens eternal destruction to those which hearken not to him, commendeth not the laws of Moses, but requireth obedience to his own laws—what can this Wisdom be but a person? If the intent were only to express that God is wise, what strange expressions would these be! To what purpose were it to give us notice that he was wise from the beginning, if there were no other mystery in it?

(3.) This person was Christ, who is the Wisdom of God, 1 Cor. i. 24; ‘And in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,’ Col. ii. 3.

3. Thirdly, That Christ was before the world was, from all eternity: Micah v. 2, ‘His goings forth are from everlasting.’ The prophet there speaketh of his birth at Bethlehem, and his eternal generation, and distinguishes the one from the other: ‘But thou, Bethlehem Ephrata, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting;’ or from the days of eternity. This last clause is added lest any should look upon this ruler as only man, and beginning to be at his incarnation. He that was born at Bethlehem was also true God, begotten of the Father from all eternity.

4. Fourthly, That Christ was God subsisting in the divine nature. I shall bring two places to prove that. The first, Phil. ii. 6, ‘Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but emptied himself, and made himself of no reputation.’ He was first in the form of God, before he appeared in the form of a servant. The form of God is his divine glory and blessedness, every way equal to God; the form of a servant is either his coming in the similitude of sinful flesh, or his subjecting himself to the curse of the law, or his humble and mean condition while he lived among men. It consists in one of these, or in all three. Now before he submitted to this, he existed in the form of God that is, was clothed with divine majesty, and in all things equal with God the Father: his being and existence which he then had was truly divine. The form of God—is the very divine essence, as clothed with glory and majesty; this did justly and naturally belong to him, and was not usurped by him. The other place is Christ’s prayer: John xvii. 5, ‘And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thy own self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.’ God is said to glorify any person when he giveth him glorious qualities and powers; or by revealing and manifesting those glorious qualities which he hath; or when he doth receive him and treat him agreeably to his glory. The meaning of Christ’s prayer, then, must be of one or other of all these senses. When he prayeth that the Father would glorify him with that glory that he had with him before the world was, if you take it in the first sense, he desireth that God would bestow upon him as Mediator, or God incarnate, a glory suitable to that glory be had with him from all eternity; if in the second sense, he desireth his glory may be revealed, or become conspicuous in his human nature; if in the third, that God would receive him honourably and agreeably to that glory: which sense is the chiefest, for it containeth the other two. The meaning, then, in short, is, that he might be received to the full enjoyment of that glory which he had before the world was. Christ was from all eternity the glorious God. This glory of his Godhead, by his humiliation was not diminished and lessened, but obscured and hidden; and therefore prayeth that he may be received by the Father, and openly declared to the world to be the Son of God; or that the glory of his Godhead might shine forth in the person of Christ, God-man. Well, then, before any creature was, Christ had a divine glory. How had it he? The enemies of this truth say, By decree or designation, not by possession. But that can not be: he that is not, hath nothing. If he had not a divine being, how ‘could he have divine glory before the world? None can say Paul was an apostle of Christ before the world was, because he was appointed or designed to this work; yea, none can say he had faith and brotherly love when he was yet an unbeliever and persecutor; yet it pleased God to separate him from his mother’s womb, and predestinated him to have these things. Again, then, all true believers may thus pray to God, ‘Glorify me with,’ &c., for they are thereunto appointed. But this is absurd. Besides, if he had it then, how could he want it now? The decree is the same. It remaineth, then, that Christ had a being and substance in the Godhead before any of the creatures were made.

Use 1. This serveth for the confutation of those atheists, that say, Christ took upon him the appellation of a god to make his doctrine more authentic and effectual. They confess the morals of Christianity are most excellent for the establishment of piety and honesty, but, men’s inclination carrying them more powerfully to vice than virtue, this doctrine would not be received with any reverence if it came recommended to them by a mere man, and therefore Christ assumed the glorious appellation of the Son of God, or pretended to be God—a blasphemy very derogatory both to the honour of Christ and Christianity, and quite contrary to the drift of the scriptures, both of the Old and New Testament. The Messiah promised in the Old Testament was to be God, all the prophets agree in that. Jesus Christ proved himself to be God by his word and works, and the apostles still assert it. Could they that lived in so many several ages as the prophets and apostles did, lay their heads together and have intelligence one with another to convey this imposture to the world? Surely, if Christ be the Messiah promised in the Old Testament, as clearly he is, then he is God, for that describeth him to be such; and if Christ usurped this honour, how did God so highly favour him with such extra ordinary graces, by inspiring him with the knowledge of the best religion in the world, to authorise him with miracles, to raise him from the dead? And must this religion, that condemneth all frauds, and doing evil that good may come of it, be supported by a lie? Or cannot God govern the world without countenancing such a deceit? Or is it possible that such holy persons as our Lord Jesus and his apostles were, could be guilty of such an imposture? Did they do this by command of God? No, surely; for God, which is the God of truth, would not command them to teach a lie, or to make use of one. He hath power enough to cause the truth to be embraced by some other means; and a greater injury cannot be done him than to go about to gratify him with what he hateth; much less would God have commanded a mere man to call himself his eternal Son, and God equal to him, which is a blasphemy and sacrilege as well as a lie—the greatest of the kind, for mortal man to take upon himself to be the eternal God. If it were not by his express commandment, would he suffer such an attempt to go unpunished? Would he witness from heaven, ‘This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased’? Would he have raised him from the dead, and so engaged the world to believe in him and adore him? Acts xvii. 31.

2. If Christ were before all things, let us prefer him above all things. This consideration is of great use to draw off our hearts from all created things, and to lessen our respects to worldly vanities, that they may be more earnestly fixed on what is eternal and glorious. He that was before the world was will be when the world shall be no more. Christ is from everlasting to everlasting, Ps. xc. 2. To him should we look, after him should we seek: he is first and last, the beginning and ending. It is for an everlasting blessedness, for the enjoyment of an eternal God, that our souls were made. He that was from the beginning, and will be when all things shall have an end, it is he that should take up our minds and thoughts. How can we have room for so many thoughts about fading glories, when we have an eternal God and Christ to think of? What light can we see in a candle when the sun shineth in his full strength? All things in the world serve only for a season, and then wither; and that season is but a short one. You glory in your riches and pre-eminence now, but how long will you do so? To-day that house and lands is thine, but thou canst not say it will be thine to-morrow. But a believer can say, ‘My God, my Christ, is mine to-day, and will be mine to all eternity.’ Death taketh all from us—honours and riches, and strength, and life; but it cannot take God and Christ from us. They are ours, and ever lastingly ours.

Secondly, We come now to the second point—his sustaining all things by his almighty power: ‘and by him all things consist.’

Doct. 2. That as Christ made all things, so he doth sustain them in being and working.

Let me explain this, how the creatures are preserved by Christ.

1. This is to be understood not only meritoriously as a moral cause, but efficiently as a natural cause of the creature’s sustentation: for the apostle doth not consider here so much what Christ doth as a Mediator, as what he doth as God. It is true Christ, as Mediator, hath reprieved the world from that ruin which might come upon it for man’s sin; but here his merit is not considered, but his power: Heb. i. 3, ‘He upholdeth all things by the word of his power.’ The weight of the whole creation lieth upon his hands. As Daniel telleth Belshazzar, that his breath and his ways were in the hand of God, Dan. v. 23, so is the being, life, and operation of all the creatures. If he should withdraw his withholding hand, they would quickly return to their first nothing; which showeth the great power of our Redeemer. Moses complaineth, Num. xi. 11, 12, ‘Thou hast laid the burden of all this people upon me. Have I conceived this people? have I begotten them, that thou shouldst say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom?’ But Christ hath the care and charge of all the world, not to rule them only, but to sustain them. A king or a governor hath a moral rule over his subjects, but Christ giveth them being and existence, and doth preserve and keep them in their present state and condition from dissolution.

2. Not only indirectly, but directly. Indirectly, Christ may be said to sustain and preserve the creatures, as he keepeth off evil, or removeth those things that may be destructive to them: as he preserveth a town that repelleth their enemies. But directly, he preserveth them as he continueth his providential influence: Acts xvii. 28, ‘For in him we live, and move, and have our being;’ as the root feedeth the fruit, or the breath of the musician maintains the sound: Ps. civ. 29, ‘Thou takest away thy breath, and they die, and return to their dust.’ Life, and all the joys and comforts of it, every minute depend upon God. It is by his providential influence and supportation we subsist. The greatest creature cannot preserve itself by its power and greatness, and the least is not neglected; both would sink into nothing without this continued influence.

3. He doth this not only mediately, by means appointed, but immediately, as his efficacy pierceth through all. God preserveth the creatures by means, for he giveth them those supplies which are proper for them: as to man, food and raiment; for other creatures, what may relieve them; and the wise dispensing these supplies, without any care and solicitude of the creatures, is a notable part of his providence. But here we consider his intimate presence with all things, by which he upholdeth their beings; which all the means of the world cannot do without him. God doth as it were hold the creatures in his own hand, that it may not sink into its old nothing, as a man holdeth a weighty thing. This is supposed to be alluded unto, Job vi. 9, ‘Let him loose his hand and cut me off.’ If he doth but loose his almighty grasp, all the creatures fall down.

4. Christ doth this so as that he doth not overturn their nature; he worketh by natural and necessary causes necessarily, with voluntary causes voluntarily. He that enlighteneth the world by the sun, causes man to discourse and reason; the sun would not shine if Christ were not the light of it, nor man discourse if he did not continue the faculty: John i. 4, ‘In him was life, and this life was the light of man.’ It is man seeth, man heareth, man talketh, man acteth, but yet ‘the seeing eye, and hearing ear, is of the Lord,’ Prov. xx. 12. As God hath made both, so he sustaineth both in their operation and exercise. All that we do naturally and spiritually we have from Christ.

5. He is not the bare instrument of God in sustaining the creature, but as a co-equal agent. As he made the world, and with the Father created all things, so he doth support and order all things. It is as well the work of the Son as of the Father, for he is God, equal with him in glory and power: John v. 17, ‘My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.’ And he hath a command of all the creatures, that they can do nothing without him, how much* soever they attempt to do against him.

Secondly, Let me give you the reasons of this, why all things must subsist by him.

1. Because preservation is but a kind of continued creation, or a continuance of the being which God hath caused. God’s will in creation maketh a thing to be, his will in preservation maketh it continue to be. The same omnipotency and efficacy of God is necessary to sustain our beings as at first to create them. Therefore, it is said, Ps. civ. 2, ‘Thou stretchest out the heavens like a curtain,’ which noteth a continued act. God erected them at first, and still sustaineth them by his secret power in this posture; so that, with respect to God, it is the same action to conserve as to create. That the creature may have a being, the influence of God is necessary to produce it; that the creature may continue its being, it is necessary that God should not break off that influence, or forsake the creature so made; for the being of the creature doth so wholly depend on the will of God, that it can not subsist without him. Nothing can be without the will of God, which is the cause both of the being and existence of all creatures. Therefore their being cannot be continued unless God will; therefore it belongeth to the same power to make anything out of nothing, and to keep anything that is made from returning to its first nothing.

2. It is impossible to cut off the dependence of the creature upon the first cause, for no creature hath a self-sufficiency to maintain and support itself. Things of art may subsist without the artificer, as a carpenter maketh a house, and then leaveth it to stand of itself, the shipwright maketh a ship, and then leaveth it to the pilot to guide it; but all things of nature depend upon God that made them, because they have their whole being from him, matter, and form, which he continueth no longer than he pleaseth, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven, visible or invisible. No impression of the agent remaineth in the effect when his action ceaseth; when the effect wholly dependeth on the cause, as when the air is enlightened which receiveth light from the sun, but when the sun is gone the light ceases: so when God withdraws the creature vanishes, for they have no other being than God is pleased to bestow upon them.

3. If it were not so, many absurdities would follow; as, for instance—

[1.] If things do subsist by themselves, then they would always be; for nothing would destroy itself.

[2.] Then the creature would be independent, and whether God will or no they would conserve their being; and then how should God govern the world? Therefore it undeniably followeth, ‘Thou hast made all things, and thou preservest them all.’

4. It would destroy all worship, and our piety and respect to God would be cold and languid. The service we owe to God is reducible to these four heads:—

[1.] Adoration of his excellent nature above all other things.

[2.] Affiance in his goodness, with expectation of relief from him.

[3.] Thankfulness for his benefits.

[4.] Obedience to his precepts and commands.

Now, unless we acknowledge his intimate presence with and preservation of all things, these necessary duties will either be quite abolished, or degenerate into a vain and needless superstition.

[1.] The adoration we owe to his excellent nature, above all other things in the universe. Alas! we see how little reverence and respect we have for the great potentates of the earth, whose fame we hear of indeed, but are not concerned in their favour or frowns, or have no dependence on them at all. The least justice of peace or constable in our neighbourhood is more to us than all these mighty foreign princes, with whom we have nothing to do but only to hear and read the reports of their greatness, when we have no other business to divert us. So cold and careless would be our respect to God if we did not depend on him every moment, and were neither concerned in his wrath nor love. Those practical atheists that were settled on their lees, and lived in a secure neglect of God, they fostered it by this presumption ‘Tush! he will neither do good nor evil,’ Zeph. i. 13. Fine things may be told us of the excellency of his nature, but what is that to us? He hath so shut up himself within the curtain of the heavens, that he takes no notice or care of things here below. How soon would such a conceit dispirit all religion, and take away the life and vigour of it! But if you would plant a reverence and due veneration of God, you must do it by this principle, ‘In his hands is the soul of every living thing^ and the breath of all mankind.’ No creature can subsist without him for a moment. Now this respect is due not only to God the Father, but our Lord Jesus Christ.

[2.] As to. trust and dependence on his goodness for relief in all our straits and necessities. This is the grand principle that keepeth up an acknowledgment of God in the world, by prayers and supplications: Ps. lxii. 8, ‘Trust in the Lord at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him.’ When you retire your souls from all secular Confidences, and repose all your trust in him, you will be instant in prayer, and earnestly beg his relief; you see all things subsist by him, and it is in vain to expect any real assistance from the creature, but what God will communicate to us by it. Now, if it be not so, but the creatures could stand of themselves, and live of them selves, this would blast all devotion, and prayer be withered and dried up at the root; humbling ourselves to God in our straits and necessities would look like dejection or poorness of spirit, whining to no purpose.

[3.] For thankfulness for benefits received, which is the great means to knit the hearts of men to God, and the bellows which bloweth up the fire of love and religion in our hearts. How can we ascribe our deliverances to God, if he hath not a hand in all things? But when we acknowledge his sustaining and governing power, we see God in the face of the creature, and every benefit we receive representeth his goodness to us. But, alas! they have no thought or care of praise and thanksgiving that think not themselves obliged to God for the least hair of their heads. God is banished out of their sight, because they look for all from the creature. But they cannot enough praise and bless God, who is the strength of their lives, and the length of their days. They acknowledge that every good gift cometh from him, that he heareth their prayers, relieveth their necessities, continues their lives to them every moment; therefore God is all in all with them, but to others he is a shadow or nothing. His memory is kept up in the world by his benefits, Acts xiv. 17.

[4.] For obedience and service to him. Certainly dependence begets allegiance and observance. We are obsequious to those from whom we expect our dole and portion: Ps. cxxxi. 2, ‘As the eyes of servants look to the hand of their masters, and the eyes of a maiden unto the hands of her mistress, so do our eyes wait on the Lord our God.’ The masters gave the men-servants their portion and allowance; and the mistress to the maid-servants: they looked for all from their hands, and therefore to them they performed their service; so do the people of God. What reverence do we owe to him who is our Creator and preserver, as well as Redeemer! As he made all things, so he supporteth all things. Did we see God in us and in all things round about us, these thoughts would be more frequent in us, and we will still be considering what we shall render unto the Lord for all his benefits towards us. But obedience soon languisheth where men think they subsist of themselves without God: Ps. lv. 19, ‘Because they have no changes, therefore they fear not God.’ They are not interrupted in their sinful course, and therefore have no reverence and respect to God.

Use 1. This doth strengthen our dependence and reliance on our blessed Redeemer. By him all things do subsist, therefore he can hear all prayers, relieve us in all our straits, supply us in all wants, preserve us in all dangers. All nations are in his hands, our whole life is in his keeping, and upheld by his intimate presence with us; our days cannot be longer nor shorter than he pleaseth. If he were absent from us, he might forget us or neglect us; but he is within us, and round about us in the effects of his power and goodness. Since he is so near us, why should we doubt of his particular care and providence? All nations are in his hands, the lives and hearts of friends and enemies, therefore our eyes should be upon him: Ps. xvi. 8, ‘I have set the Lord always before me, he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.’ We set the Lord before us both in point of reverence and dependence—for fear and trust agree in their common nature—and so it may note our care to please him, or our trust and quietness in him. All means are nothing to us, can do nothing for us without him.

2. It teaches us a lesson of humility. We depend on him every moment, can do nothing without him, either in a way of nature or grace; not in a way of nature, for God hath not left us to stand by ourselves on the first foundation of our creation. The creatures are not capable of subsistence without dependence on the first cause, but merely live and act by his power: ‘In him we live and move and have our being:’ Ps. civ. 29, ‘Thou takest away their breath and they die, and return to their dust.’ The withdrawing his concurrence and supportation is the cause of all our misery. When he sees fit, all the creatures soon return to the elements of which they are compounded; all the strokes and judgments which light upon them are dispensed according to his pleasure. In a way of grace we are nothing, can do nothing without him, John xv. 5. He must have all the praise, Luke xvi. 14, 1 Cor. xv. 10, Gal. ii. 20. The more perfections we have, the more prone we are to fall if he sustain us not: witness the fallen angels, and Adam in innocency.

3. It teaches us a lesson of reverence and obedience. If God be so near, let us observe him, and take notice of his presence. He knoweth what he doth when he sustaineth such a creature as thou art. This thought should continually affect us—that God is with us, still by us, not only without us, but within us, preserving our life, upholding our being. It should be a check to our sluggishness, and mispense of time—Doth God now continue me? to what end and purpose? If God were absent or gone, it were more justifiable to loiter or indulge the ease of the flesh; but to spend my time vainly and foolishly, which he continueth for service, what have we to say?

SERMON V.

And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the first-born from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.—Col. I. 18.

THE context is spent in representing the dignity and excellency of Christ. He is set forth by three things:—

1. By the excellency of the benefits we have by him—the greatest the fallen creature is capable of for the present, ver. 14.

2. By the excellency of his person; so he is set forth as the eternal and only-begotten Son of God, ver. 15, and proved by his being the Creator and preserver of all things. The Creator, ver. 16; the preserver, ver. 17. Now the apostle cometh to the third thing.

3. The excellency of his office. This is done in the text; where, observe, that next after the Son of God there is nothing more venerable and august than Christ’s being head of the church. And again, that Christ hath another title to us than that of Creator: he is Redeemer also. The same God that created us by his power hath redeemed us by his mercy. By the one he drew us out of no thing, by the other he recovered us out of sin. Therefore, after he had declared what Christ is to the world and the church too, he showeth what Christ is particularly to the church. He hath a superiority over angels and all creatures, but he is our head: Eph. i. 22, ‘He hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be head over all things to the church.’ Christ is the sovereign of the world, but, by a special relation to his people, ‘he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the first-born from the dead,’ &c.

In which words observe:—

1. The titles which are given to Christ with respect to the church: he is the head, the beginning, the first-born from the dead.

2. The consequence of it: that in all things he might have the preeminence.

1. The titles ascribed to Christ. They are three:—

[1.] The first is ‘the head of the body, the church’—where observe two correlatives, the head and the body; the head is Christ, the body is the church. The head is the most eminent part of the body, the noblest both as to nature, and place, or situation. As to nature, the head is the most illustrious throne of the soul, as being the seat not only of the nerves and senses, but of the memory and understanding. In place, as nearest heaven, the very situation doth in a manner oblige the other parts to respect it. These things agree to Christ, who, as to his essence, is infinitely of much more worth than the church, as being the only-begotten Son of God. As to office, in him there is a fulness of perfection to perform the office of a head to such a crazy and necessitous body as the church is. All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are in our head for the use of the body, Col. ii. 3; and he is also the fountain of life and grace to every particular member, John i. 16. And, for place, he reigneth in heaven with his Father, and from thence he vieweth all the necessities of the body, and sendeth forth such influences of grace as are needful to every particular member.

For the other correlative—the church is the body. By the church is meant the church mystical, or all such as are called out of the world to be a peculiar people unto God. Now, these considered collectively or together, they are a body; but singly and separately, every believer is a member of that body: 1 Cor. xii. 29, ‘Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.’ All the parts and members joined together are a spiritual body, but the several persons are members of that body. Yea, though there be many particular churches, yet they are not many bodies, but one body, so it is said, 1 Cor. xii. 12, ‘As the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ.’ He is the head, and the many and divers members of the universal Christian church are but one body. The universal invisible church of real believers is one mystical body knit by faith to Christ, their head, and by love among themselves. And the visible universal church is one politic body, conjoined with Christ their head, and among themselves, by an external entering into covenant with God, and the serious profession of all saving truths. They have all the same king and head, the same laws—the word of God—the same sacraments of admission and nutrition, which visibly, at least, they subject themselves unto, and have a grant of the same common privileges in the gospel. But of this more anon.

[2.] The next title is ἀρχὴ, the beginning. I understand it that he is the root and the beginning of the renewed estate. The same degree which Christ hath in the order of nature, he hath in the order of grace also: he is the beginning both of creation, so also of redemption: he is origo mundi melioris, still the beginning and ending of the new creature as well as the old, Rev. i. 8. He is called, in short, the beginning, with respect to the life of grace; as in the next title, ‘the first born from the dead,’ with respect to the life of glory.

[3.] The third title is, the first-born from the dead. He had before called him the first-born of every creature, now the first-born from the dead: Rev. i. 5, ‘The first-begotten from the dead,’ because those that arise from the dead are, as it were, new-born; whence also the resurrection from the dead is called a regeneration, Mat. xix. 20: and St Paul referreth that prophecy, Ps. ii. 7, ‘Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee,’ in Acts xiii. 33, to the resurrection of Christ. Things are said to be when they are manifested to be: compare Rom. i. 4, ‘Declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.’ He was declared to be the true, and everlasting Son of, God, and head of the church: so the adoption of believers shall appear by their resurrection: Rom. viii. 19, ‘The earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God;’ ver. 23, ‘We ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body.’

2. The sequel and consequent of these things: that in all things he might have the pre-eminence—that is, as well in the spiritual estate of the church as in the creation and natural estate of the world: Rom. viii. 29, ‘That he might be the first-born among many brethren.’

I begin with the first.

Doct. 1. That this is the honour appropriate and peculiar to Jesus Christ, to be head of the church.

1. Here I shall show what the church is to which Christ is an head.

2. How is he an head to this body.

3. The reasons why this body must have such an head.

1. What the church is. A society of men called out of the world by God’s effectual grace, according to the purpose of his election, and united to Christ by faith and the participation of his Spirit, and to one another by the band of charity that after remission of sins obtained in this world, together with regenerating grace, they may at length be brought to eternal life. Let us a little open this description. By effectual calling God worketh faith, which uniteth us to Christ, and that effectual calling is the fruit of election; and the effect of this union is remission of sins, and the necessary consequence of this communion is salvation or eternal life. This society of men is called a church in the text. The word church is taken in divers acceptations.

First, and most properly, it signifies those whom I have now described, the universal collection of all and every one of those who, according to the good pleasure of God, are, or may be, called out of a state of sin into a state of grace, to obtain eternal glory by our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the church of the first-born whose names are written in heaven, Heb. xii. 22—that chosen generation, that royal priesthood, that holy nation, that peculiar people, whom to show forth his praises God hath called out of darkness into his marvellous light, 1 Pet. ii. 9. This church, most generally and properly taken, is the kingdom of God, the body and spouse of Christ: Cant. vi. 9, ‘My dove, my undefiled one, is but one.’ This is that one fold under one shepherd, John x. 16. And it was prophesied of Christ that he should die to gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad, John xi. 52.

Secondly, Of this universal church there are two parts—one of travellers, the other of comprehensors, or the church militant and triumphant; they both belong to God’s family: Eph. iii. 15, ‘Of whom the whole family, whether in heaven or earth, is named;’ so Col. i. 10. That part of the family which is in heaven triumpheth with God there—that which is in earth is yet warring against sin, Satan, and the world.

Thirdly, This part, which is the military, comes in the second place to be called by the name of the universal church, because, being scattered and dispersed throughout the whole world, it comprehendeth all and every one that belongeth to Christ’s flock, which are found in several folds: known to God they are, and to themselves, and do indeed belong to Christ’s body and his kingdom. This is often and not un deservedly called the invisible church, because, so far as it is the church of God, their reality and sincerity is rather believed by faith than seen by the eyes of the body. This church, this kingdom of God, though it be yet in this world, yet it is not of the world, neither doth it come with observation, for the faithful have this kingdom of God within them, Luke xvii. 20. The world knows them not, other believers know them not, but God knoweth those that are his, 2 Tim. ii. 19.

Fourthly, The universal visible church. While they are in the way, and in the midst of their conflicts, it is possible many hypocrites may take up the profession, as in the great house are many vessels, some to honour, some to dishonour. From these ariseth an external promiscuous multitude, who also are called the catholic church, for the sake and with respect to those holy ones among them who truly belong to Christ’s mystical body. We read often the kingdom is like to a net wherein are good and bad fishes, Mat. xiii.; to a thrashing-floor wherein is chaff and wheat; to a field wherein groweth good corn and also tares, Mat. xiii. 24, 25. Now all these ways is the universal church taken.

Fifthly, There are particular churches wherein the ordinances and means of grace are dispensed, as the church of Corinth, Cenchrea, Galatia, Greek, Roman. None of these particular churches contain all believers or the elect of God, that out of them or any of them there should be no salvation. Again, the universal church may remain in the world total and entire, though these particular churches, one or other of them, may successively be destroyed, as it hath often fallen out. And it is a great sin so to cry up a particular church as to exclude all the rest from saving communion with Christ; and for any one particular church to arrogate power over the others, they being but members.

This church is called a body in two respects:—

SERMON VI.

Who is the beginning, the first-born from the dead.—Col. I. 18.

I COME now to consider the first particular title which is given to Christ.

There are two other titles given to Christ—the one respects the state of grace, the other .the state of glory. And,

First, With respect to the state of grace, he is called ἀρχὴ, the beginning—that is, Origo mundi melioris, the beginning of the new creature as well as the old; for the same place and dignity which Christ hath in the order of nature he hath in the order of grace also. Therefore he is called ‘the beginning of the creation of God.’ Rev. iii. 14. The word ἀρχὴ is not taken there passively, as if it were the first thing that was created, but actively, that he giveth a being and beginning to all things that are created, and by the creation of God is meant the new creation. So that the point is—

Doct. That Jesus Christ is the author and beginning of the new creation.

I shall briefly explain this, and pass to the next branch. Christ is the beginning two ways:—

I. In a way of order and dignity.

II. In a way of causality.

I. In a way of order, as first and chief of the renewed state. This is many ways set forth in scripture. Two things I shall take notice of:—

1. That he is the builder of the church.

2. The lord and governor of it.

1. As founder and builder of the church: Mat. xvi. 18, ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I build my church.’ Christ challenges it to himself as his own peculiar prerogative to build the church. More fully, the apostle, Heb. iii. 3-5, ‘For this man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he that builded the house hath more honour than the house; for every house is built by some man, but he that buildeth all things is God. And again, Moses was faithful in all his house as a servant, but Christ as a Son over his own house.’ The scope of the apostle is to prove that Christ must have the pre-eminence above all others that have been employed in and about God’s house. Moses was one of the chief of that sort, that had greater familiarity with God than others, and intrusted by him in very great and weighty matters; yet Christ was not only equal to Moses, but far above him. He proveth it by a comparison taken from a builder and an house, and from a lord of the house and a servant in the house; but Christ is the builder of the house, and Moses but a part of the house. Christ is the Lord, and Moses but the servant, therefore Christ is more excellent and worthy of greater honour. One of the noblest works of God is the church of the first-born; none could build, frame, and constitute this but the Son of God coming down in our flesh, and so recovering the lost world into an holy society which might be dedicated to God. For the materials of this house are men sinful and guilty. Neither men nor angels could raise them up into an holy temple to God; none but the eternal Word or the Son of God incarnate: ‘he that buildeth all things is God’—τα πὰντα, all these things, the things treated of; he doth not speak of the first creation, but the second, the restoring of the lapsed world to God.

2. The other honour is that Christ is Lord of the new creation, as well as the founder and builder of it; for the world to come is put in subjection to him, not to the angels, Heb. ii. 7. By the world to come is not meant the state of glory, but the state of the church under the times of the gospel. It is made subject to God the Redeemer; it is solely and immediately in his power, and under his authority, and cast into a dependence upon him.

II. In a way of causality. So he is the beginning, either as a moral or efficient cause.

1. As a moral meritorious cause. We are renewed by God’s creating power, but through the intervening mediation of Christ, or God’s creating power is put forth with respect to his merit. The life of grace is purchased by his death: 1 John iv. 9, ‘God sent his only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live by him.’ Here spiritually, hereafter eternally. For life is opposite to death incurred by sin. We were dead legally, as sentenced to death by the law; and spiritually, as disabled for the service of our Creator. And how by him? That he speaketh of ver. 10—by his being a propitiation. We were in the state of death when the doors of mercy were first opened to us, under the guilt and power of sin; but we live when the guilt of sin is pardoned, and the power of sin broken. But this life we have not without Christ being a propitiation for our sins, or doing that which was necessary, whereby God without impeachment of honour might show himself placable and propitious to mankind.

2. As an efficient cause; by the efficacy of his Spirit, who worketh in us as members of Christ’s mystical body. Wherefore it is said, 2 Cor. v. 17, ‘If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature;’ and Eph. ii. 10, ‘We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works.’ Whatever grace we have cometh from God through Christ as Mediator, and from him we have it by virtue of our union with him. It is first applied by the converting grace, and then continually supplied by the confirming grace of the Spirit. The influence we have from him as our head is life and likeness.

[1.] Life: Gal. ii. 20, ‘I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh,’ &c. Christ is the beginning of the new life, therefore he is called the prince, or author of life. All life is derived from the head to the body, so we derive life from Christ: John vi. 57, ‘As I live by the Father, so he that eateth me shall live by me.’ We derive life from Christ, as he from the Father.

[2.] Likeness: Gal. iv. 19, ‘My little children, of whom I travail in birth till Christ be formed in you,’ and 2 Cor. iii. 18. It is for the honour of Christ that his image and superscription should be upon his members, to distinguish them from others. In short, as to life, he is the root: John xv. 1, 2, ‘I am the true vine, and.’ &c. As to likeness, he is the pattern: Rom. viii. 29, ‘Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate, to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren.’

Secondly, The reasons of this.

1. It is for the honour of the Son of God that he should be head of the new world. In the kingdom of Christ all things are new. There is a new covenant, which is the gospel; a new paradise, not that where Adam enjoyed God among the beasts and trees of the garden, but where the blessed enjoy God amongst the angels. A new ministry, not the family of Aaron, or tribe of Levi, but the ministry of reconciliation, whom God hath qualified and fitted to be dispensers of these holy mysteries. New ordinances; we serve God not in the oldness of the letter, but the newness of the Spirit; new members, or new creatures, that are made partakers of the benefits, therefore also a new head, or a second Adam, that must be the beginning of this new creation, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ, who is made a quickening spirit to all his members: 1 Cor. xv. 45, ‘The first Adam was made a living soul, the second a quickening spirit.’ Adam communicated natural life to his posterity, but from Christ we have the Spirit.

2. It is suited to our lost estate. We were in a state of apostasy and defection from God, averse from all good, prone to all evil. Now that we might have a new being and life, the Son of God came in our nature to rectify the disordered creation. The scripture representeth man as blind in his mind, perverse in his will, rebellious in his affections, having no sound part left in him to mend the rest; therefore we must be changed. But by whom? who shall make us of unclean to become pure and holy? Not one amongst all the bare natural sons of men, Job xiv. 4. Of carnal to become spiritual? We must be new made and new born: John iii. 6, ‘That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit;’ that we may mind the things of the Spirit, and not of the flesh. Of worldly to become heavenly? ‘He that formeth us for this very thing is God.’ 2 Cor. v. 5. He that is the framer and maker of all things; a God of infinite wisdom, power, and love, he frameth and createth us anew.

Use 1. To show us the necessity of regeneration.

Use 2. The excellence of it.

1. The necessity. We must have another beginning than we had as bare creatures: it is one thing to make us men, another to make us saints or Christians. We have understanding, will, affections, and senses as men, but we have these sanctified as Christians. The world thinketh Christianity puts strange names upon ordinary things; but is it an ordinary thing to row against the stream of flesh and blood, and to raise men to those inclinations and affections to which nature is an utter stranger—to have a divine nature put into us? 2 Pet. i. 4. The necessity is more bound upon us if we look upon ourselves not only as men but Christians; for whosoever is in Christ is a new creature. Some are in Christ by external profession, de jure; they are bound to be new creatures, that they may not dishonour their head. Others by real internal union. They not only ought to be, but de facto are, new creatures, because they are made partakers of his Spirit, and by that Spirit are renewed and sanctified. Little can they make out their recovery to God, and interest in Christ, who are not sensible of any change wrought in them, who have the old thoughts, the old discourses, the old passions, and the old affections, and their old conversations still; the same deadness to holy things, the same proneness to please the flesh, the same carelessness to please or honour God; and the drift and bent of their lives is as much for the world, and as little for God and heaven as before.

2. The excellency of regeneration or renewing grace. What a benefit it is, it appeareth in two things:—

1. That it is the fruit of reconciling grace: 2 Cor. v. 18, ‘All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation.’ God gives grace only as the God of peace, as pacified by the death of Christ. The Holy Spirit is the gift of his love, and the fruit of this peace and reconciliation which Christ made for us. Our Lord Jesus Christ merited this grace by the value of his sacrifice and bloody sufferings, Titus iii. 5, 6.

2. It is applied to us by the almighty power of his Spirit. Christ is first the ransom for, then the fountain of life to, our souls; and so the honour of our entire and whole recovery is to be ascribed only to our Redeemer, who, as he satisfied the justice of God for our sins, so he also purchased a power to change our hearts; and he purchased this power into his own hands, not into another’s, and therefore doth accomplish it by his Spirit, 2 Cor. iii. 18. We should often think what a foundation God hath laid for the dispensation of his grace, and how he would demonstrate his infinite love in giving us his Son to be a propitiation for us, and at the same time showeth forth his infinite power in renewing and changing the heart of man, and all to bring us back to him, to make us capable of serving and pleasing him.

I come now to the other title, which respects the life of glory: ‘The first-born from the dead.’ The same appellation almost is given to Christ when he is called, Rev. i. 5, ‘The first-begotten from the dead.’ The reason of both is, because those that arise from the dead are, as it were, new born, and, therefore, the resurrection from the dead is called a regeneration, Mat. xix. 28. And as to Christ in particular, the grave, when he was in it, is represented as being under the pains and throes of a woman in travail: Acts ii. 24, λύσας τὰς ὠδῖνας τοῦ θανάτου, ‘God having loosed the pains of death, for it was not possible that he should be holden of it;’ but which is not only a metaphor, but a higher mystery. St Paul referreth that prophecy, Ps. ii. 7, ‘Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee,’ in Acts xiii. 33, to the resurrection of Christ: ‘God hath raised up Jesus from the dead; as it is also written, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.’ Things are said to be done when they are manifested to be done. Compare Rom. i. 4, ‘Declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.’ So the adoption of believers shall appear by their resurrection: Rom. viii. 19, ‘The earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God;’ ver. 23, ‘And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body;’ 1 John iii. 2, ‘It doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.’ This for the title of ‘First-born from the dead.’

Doct. That Christ’s rising from the dead is the evidence and assurance of a Christian’s happy resurrection.

1. Let me open the terms.

2. Vindicate the notion.

3. Show you how this is an evidence and assurance to all good Christians of their happy and joyful resurrection.

1. For the terms. He is here called ‘The first-born from the dead.’ If the grave was as the womb to him, and his resurrection as a birth, then Christ was in a manner born when he rose again. Only he hath the precedency—he is the first-born, he rises first, and surely others will follow after him. So we read, Acts xxvi. 23, ‘That he should be the first-born that should rise from the dead;’ as he saith elsewhere, ‘First Christ, then they that are Christ’s.’ Christ hath the primacy of order and the principality of influence. So again he is said to be ‘the first-fruits of them that slept,’ 1 Cor. xv. 20. As in the consecrating of the first-fruits the whole harvest is also consecrated, so Christ by rising himself raises all others with him to eternal glory and happiness. And so his resurrection is a certain proof that others shall have a resurrection also.

2. Let us vindicate the notion here used by the apostle. How was he the first-born, the first-fruits, the first raised from the dead? Two objections lie against it:—

[1.] That many were raised from the dead before Christ.

[2.] Concerning the resurrection of the wicked. They are not parts of his mystical body, and in respect of them how could Christ rise as the first-born and the first-fruits?

I. For the first objection, how was Christ the first, since many were raised before him? As the widow of Sarepta’s son, who was raised to life by Elijah, 1 Kings xvii.; the Shunammite’s son by Elisha, 2 Kings iv.; a dead man by the touch of Elisha’s bones, 2 Kings xiii. 21. Our Saviour in his lifetime raised the widow of Nam’s only son, Luke vii. 15; Jairus’s daughter, Luke viii. 55; Lazarus, John xi. 44; some others at his death, Mat. xxvii. 52. How was he then the first? I answer—

[1.] We must distinguish of a proper and an improper resurrection. Christ was the first-born from the dead, because he arose from the dead by a proper resurrection, which is to arise again to a life immortal; others were raised again to a mortal estate, and so the great disease was rather removed than cured. Christ’s resurrection is a resurrection to immortality, not to die any more; as the apostle saith, ‘Death hath no more power over him.’ They only returned to their natural life, they were raised from the dead, but still mortal; but ‘he whom God raised again shall see no corruption,’ Acts xiii. 34.

[2.] Others are raised by the power and virtue of his resurrection, but he hath risen again by his own power, John x. 18, ‘I have power to lay down my life, and power to take it up again.’ Raising the dead is a work of divine power, for it belongs to him to restore life who gave it at first. Therefore Christ is said not only to be raised again, but to rise from the dead: Rom. iv. 25, ‘He died for our offences, and rose again for our justification.’ as the sun sets and rises by his own motion.

[3.] All those that rose again before Christ, arose only by special dispensation, to lay down their bodies once more when God should see fit, and rose only as private and single persons; but Christ rose as a public person. His resurrection is the cause and pattern of ours, for head and members do not rise by a different power; he rose again to show the virtue that should quicken our mortal bodies, and raise them at length.

2. The second objection is concerning the raising of the wicked. Christ cannot be the first-born or the first-fruits to them, they belong not to his mystical body. The first-born implieth a relation to the rest of the family; and offering of the first-fruits did not sanctify the tares, the cockle, or the darnel, or the weeds that grow amongst the corn, but only the corn itself. I answer—

[1.] Certain it is that the wicked shall rise again, there is no question of that, Acts xxiv. 15. I believe a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust, all that have lived, whether they have done good or evil: Mat. v. 45, ‘He makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust;’ and it is said, John v. 28, 29, ‘All that are in their graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth, they that have done good to the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil to the resurrection of damnation.’ Both must rise, that both may receive a full recompense according to their several ways; and though it be said, Ps. i. 5, ‘The ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.’ it doth not infringe this truth. The sense is, those unhappy miscreants shall not be able to abide the trial, as being self-condemned. To stand in the judgment is to make a bold defence. And whereas it is said, also, they shall not stand in the congregation of the righteous, you must know that at the day of doom there is a congregation or a gathering together of all men, then a segregation, a separating the sheep from the goats, then an aggregation—‘He shall set the sheep on his right hand and the goats on his left’—so that they make up two distinct bodies, one of the good, which is there called the congregation of the righteous, the other of the wicked, who are to be judged by Christ as a just and righteous judge, assisted with his holy angels, and the great assembly and council of saints. Not one of the sinners shall remain in the company of the righteous, nor appear in their society.

[2.] The wicked are raised ex officio judicis, not beneficio mediatoris; they are raised by Christ as a judge, but not by him as a Redeemer. The .one sort are raised by the power of his vindicative justice, the other by the Holy Ghost by virtue of his covenant: Rom. viii. 11, ‘He shall quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.’ The one by Christ’s power from without, put forth by him as judge of dead and living; the other by an inward quickening influence that flows from him as their proper head. When the reaper gathers the wheat into his barn, the tares are bound in bundles and cast into unquenchable fire, Mat. xiii. 30.

SERMON VII.

For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell.—Col. I. 19; with,

For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.—Chap. II. 9.

THESE words are produced to prove that there is no defect in the evangelical doctrine, and therefore there needeth no addition to it from the rudiments of men. That there is no defect, he proveth from the author of it, Jesus Christ, who was not only man, but God; and beyond the will of God we need not look. If God will come from heaven to teach us the way thither, surely his teaching is sufficient, his doctrine containeth all things necessary to salvation. This is the argument of these words, ‘For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.’

In which words, observe three things:—

First, The house: in Him.

Secondly, The inhabitant: all the fulness of the Godhead.

Thirdly, The manner of dwelling: in the word bodily.

First, the house, or place of residence: ‘in Him.’ In the man Christ Jesus, or in that human nature in which he carried on the business of our salvation; as despicable and abject as it was in the eyes of men, yet it was the temple and seat of the Godhead.

Secondly, The inhabitant: ‘the fulness of the Godhead;’ not a portion of God only, or his gifts and graces (as we are made partakers of the divine nature, 1 Pet. i. 4.), but the whole Godhead.

Thirdly, The manner, συμβολικῶς, ‘bodily.’ The word may relate—

1. To the shadows and figures of the law, and so it signifieth essentially, substantially. God dwelt in the tabernacle, temple, or ark of the covenant, συμβολικῶς, because of the figures of his presence. In Christ, σωματικῶς, bodily, as his human nature was the true tabernacle or temple in which he resideth. Christ calls his human nature a temple, John ii. 19. Or else,

2. With respect to the intimacy and closeness of the union. So σωματικῶς may be rendered personally; for body is often put for a person. The two natures were so united in him, that he is one Christ.

Doct. That Jesus Christ is true God and true man in one person.

I shall prove the point:—

1. By testimonies of scripture.

2. By types.

3. By reasons taken from Christ’s office.

1. By testimonies of scripture. I shall pass by those that speak of the reality of either nature apart, and only allege those that speak of both together. Now these do either belong to the Old Testament or the New. I begin with the former, the testimonies of the Old Testament, because this union of the two natures in the person of Christ is indeed a mystery, but such as was foretold long before it came to pass; and many of the places wherein it was foretold were so understood by the ancient Jews. The controversy between them and Christians was not whether the Messiah were to be both God and man—they agreed in that—but whether this was fulfilled, or might be applied to Jesus of Nazareth. But the latter Jews, finding themselves not able to stand to the issue of that plea, say that we attribute many things to Jesus of Nazareth which were not foretold of the Messiah to come, as namely, that he should be God-man in one person; therefore it is necessary that this should be proved, that the Old Testament aboundeth with predictions of this kind. Let us begin with the first promise touching the Messiah, which was made to Adam after his fall, for the restoring of mankind: Gen. iii. 15, ‘The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head.’ That is to say, one of her seed, to be born in time, should conquer the devil, death, and sin. Now, when he is called the ‘seed of the woman ‘it is apparent he must be man, and made of a woman. And when it is said that ‘he shall break the serpent’s head,’ who can do this but only God? It is a work of divine omnipotency, for Satan hath much more power than any bare man. Therefore it is said, Rom. xvi. 20, ‘The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly.’ Come we next to the promise made to Abraham, Gen. xii. 3, ‘In thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed.’ In thee, that is, in thy seed, as it is often explained: Gen. xxii. 18, ‘In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.’ This seed was Christ, the Messiah to come. Now he was to be God-man: he was to be man, for he is the seed of Abraham; God, because that blessedness is remission of sins, or justification. For it is said, Gal. iii. 8, ‘The scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations of the earth be blessed.’ Regeneration and the renovation of our natures is also included in it, as a part of this blessing: Acts iii. 25, 26, ‘Ye are children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, In thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed. Therefore unto you first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from his iniquities.’ There is also redemption from the curse of the law, and the gift of eternal life included in it. Now all these are works proper to God alone. Let us come to the promise made to David: 2 Sam. vii. 12, 13, ‘I will set up thy seed after thee, and I will establish the throne of thy kingdom for ever.’ It is spoken in the type of Solomon, but in the mystery of Christ, who is true man as David’s seed, and true God, for his kingdom is everlasting. And so David interpreteth it: Ps. xlv. 6, ‘Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever.’ The kingdom of the Messiah is never to have an end. And the apostle affirmeth expressly that those words are spoken to Christ the Son of God, Heb. i. 7. Let me next allege Job’s confession of faith, which was very ancient: Job xix. 25, 26, ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh I shall see God.’ His Redeemer was true man, as appeareth by his title Goel; and because he shall stand on the earth, and be seen by his bodily eyes; true God, for he calleth him so: ‘I shall see God.’ Go we on in the scriptures: Isa. iv. 2, Christ is prophesied of: ‘In that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful , and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely.’ When he is called ‘the branch of the Lord,’ his Godhead is signified; when he is called ‘the fruit of the earth,’ his manhood. So again, Isa. vii. 14, ‘A virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and thou shall call his name Immanuel—‘that is to say, ‘God with us;’ which can agree to none but to him that is God and man. So that this mystery of God incarnate was not hid from the church of the Old Testament, for his very name did import God with us, or God in our nature reconciling us to himself. So Isa. ix. 6, ‘To us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulders, and his name shall be called The Wonderful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the ever lasting Father, the Prince of Peace.’ Who can interpret these speeches and attributes but of one who is God-man? How could he else be a child and yet the everlasting Father—born of a virgin, and yet the mighty God? So Isa. xi. 1, with the 4th verse, ‘A rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots: ‘therefore man; and ver. 4, ‘He shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked: ‘therefore God. So Isa. liii. 8, ‘He shall be taken from prison and judgment:’ therefore man; yet ‘who shall declare his generation?’ therefore God. So Jer. xxiii. 5, 6, ‘A branch raised unto David from his dead stock: ‘therefore man: yet ‘the Lord, or Jehovah our righteousness;’ therefore God. Shall I urge that speech whereby Jesus did silence divers of the learned pharisees? Ps. ex. 1, ‘The Lord said to my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, until I make thy foes thy footstool.’ He was born in the mean estate of human flesh and King David’s seed, and yet David’s Lord; which he could not be if he were not God himself, the King of kings, and Lord of lords. Well, then, he was David’s son as man, but David’s Lord as he was God. And so do many of the ancient Jewish rabbins interpret this place. So again, Micah v. 2, ‘Thou Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from old, from everlasting.’ He is born in Bethlehem, yet his goings forth are from everlasting. He came out of Bethlehem, and therefore man; his goings forth are from everlasting, and therefore God. So Zech. xii. 10, ‘I will pour out the spirit of grace and supplication, and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced.’ He is God, because he giveth the Spirit of grace; man, because he is pierced or crucified. So Zech. xiii. 7, ‘Against the man, my fellow.’ A man he was, but God’s companion, his only-begotten Son, and co-essential with himself, and so God.

Secondly, Come we now to the New Testament, in which this mystery is more plainly and fully demonstrated. There often the Son of Man is plainly asserted to be also the Son of God. Thomas calleth him his Lord, his God, John xx. 28. We are told that the Word was made flesh, John i. 14; that God purchased the church with his own blood, Acts xx. 28, which can be understood of no other but Christ, by whose blood we are redeemed, and who, being incarnate, hath blood to shed for us. But God, as a pure spirit, hath not flesh and blood and bones as we have: so Rom. i. 3, 4, ‘Jesus Christ was made of the seed of David, according to the flesh, but declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness,’ &c. In respect of his divine subsistence, he was begotten, not made; in regard of his human nature, made, not begotten. True man, as David was, and true God, as the Spirit and divine nature is. Again, Rom. ix. 5, ‘Whose are the Father’s, and of whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever.’ Than which nothing can be said more express as to that nature which is most apt to be questioned; for surely he that is God over all cannot be said to be a mere creature. The Jews confessed him to be man, and one of their blood, and Paul asserteth him to be God over all; they accounted him to be accursed, and Paul asserteth him to be blessed for ever; they thought him inferior to the patriarchs of whom he descended; and Paul over all. So that no word is used in vain; and when he saith ‘according to the flesh,’ he insinuateth another nature in him to be considered by us. The next place is 1 Cor. ii. 8, ‘They crucified the Lord of glory.’ He was crucified—there his human nature is acknowledged; but in respect of the divine nature he is called ‘the Lord of glory:’ as in the 24th Psalm, the Lord or King of glory is Jehovah Sabaoth, ‘the Lord of hosts.’ Go we further: Phil. ii. 6, 7, ‘Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men.’ By the form of God is meant not only the divine majesty and glory, but also the divine essence itself—for without it there can be no true divine majesty and glory. Now this he kept hidden under his human nature, letting only some small rays sometimes to shine forth in his miracles. But that which was most sensible and conspicuous in him was a true human nature in a low and contemptible estate. Again, 1 Tim. iii. 16, ‘Great is the mystery of godliness, God manifested in our flesh’—that is, the eternal Son of God became man, and assumed the human nature into the unity of his person. Once more: 1 Pet. iii. 18, ‘He was put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the Spirit’—that is, died according to his human nature, but by his divine nature raised from the dead. It is not meant of his soul. Quickened signifies not one remaining alive, but made alive—that power belongeth to God.

Secondly, By types. Those that come to hand are these:—

1. Melchisedec: Gen. xiv. 18, ‘Melchisedec, King of Salem, brought forth bread and wine to Abraham.’ Which type is interpreted by the apostle, Heb. vii. 2, 3, ‘First being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of peace; without father and without mother; having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth a priest continually.’ What Melchisedec was is needless to dispute. The apostle considereth him only as he is represented in the story of Moses, who maketh no mention of his father or mother, birth or death. Certainly he was a very man; but as he standeth in scripture there is no mention of father or mother, beginning or end, what he was, or of whom he came. So is Christ as God without mother, as man without father; as God without beginning, as God-man without ending of life.

2. Another type of him was Jacob’s ladder, the top of which reached heaven, and the bottom reached earth, Gen. xxviii. 12; and the angels of God were ascending and descending upon it. This ladder represented Christ the Son of man, upon whom the angels of God ascend and descend, John i. 51. The bottom, which reached the earth, represented Christ’s human nature and conversing with men; the top, which reached heaven, his heavenly and divine nature; and in both his mediation with God for men. Ascende per hominem, et pervenies ad Deum. Christ reaches to heaven in his divine original; to earth in his manhood, and him the angels serve. By his dwelling in our nature, this commerce between earth and heaven is brought about.

The third type is the fiery cloudy pillar: Exod. xiii. 21, ‘And the Lord went before them in the day in a pillar of a cloud; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night.’ This figured Christ’s guidance and protection of his church travelling through this world to his heavenly rest. The cloud signified his humanity, the fire his divinity. There were two different substances, the fire and the cloud, yet but one pillar. So there are two different natures in Christ, his divinity shining as fire, his humanity darkening as a cloud, yet but one person. That pillar departed not from them all the while they travelled in the wilderness; so, while the church’s pilgrimage lasteth, Christ will conduct us, and comfort and shelter us by his presence. His mediatory conduct ceaseth not.

The fourth type is the tabernacle, wherein God dwelt symbolically, as in Christ bodily. There God sat on the mercy-seat, which is called ἱλαστήριον, Heb. ix. 5. So Christ: Rom. iii. 25, ‘A propitiation.’ He there dwelt between the cherubim s, and did exhibit himself graciously to his people, as now he doth to us by Christ. The next shall be of the scape-goat on the day of expiation, Lev. xvi. 10. One goat was to be slain, the other kept alive. The slain goat signified τὴν σάρκα, τὸ παθητόν, his flesh, or human nature suffering; the live goat, τὸ ἀναθὲς τ8ῆς Θεότητος, his immortal deity, or as the apostle expresseth it, 2 Cor. xiii. 4, That Christ was to be ‘crucified through weakness,’ yet to ‘live by the power of God;’ or as we heard before, 1 Pet. iii. 18, ‘Put to death in the flesh, and quickened by the Spirit.’ Because these two things could not be shadowed by any one beast, which the priest having killed, could not make alive again; and it was not fit that God should work miracles about types, therefore he appointed two, that in the slain beast his death might be represented, in the live beast his immortality. The like mystery was represented also in the two birds for the cleansing of the leper, Lev. xiv. 6, 7.

Thirdly, I prove it by reasons taken from his office, which may be considered in the general; and so it is expressed by one word, Mediator; or in particular, according to the several functions of it, expressed by the terms of King, Priest, and Prophet; or with respect to the persons that are to be considered and concerned in Christ’s mediation.

1. His office considered in the general: so he is called, ‘Jesus the mediator of the New Testament,’ Heb. xii. 24. It was agreeable that μεσίτης, a mediator, should be μεσῇ, a middle person, of the same essence with both parties, and that his operative mediation should presuppose his substantial mediation; that, being God-man in the same person, he should make an atonement between God and man. Sin hath made such a breach and distance between us and God, that it raiseth our fears, and causeth backwardness to draw nigh unto him, and so hindereth our love and confidence in him. How can we depend upon one so far above us, and out of the reach of our commerce? Therefore a mediator is necessary, one that will pity us, and is more near and dear to God than we are. One in whom God doth condescend to man, and by whom man may be encouraged to ascend to God. Now, who is so fit for this as Jesus Christ, ‘God manifested in our flesh’? The two natures met together in his person, and so God is nearer to man than he was before in the pure deity; for he is come down to us in our flesh, and hath assumed it into the unity of his person; and man is nearer to God, for our nature dwelleth with him so closely united, that we may have more familiar thoughts of God, and a confidence that he will look after us, and concern himself in our affairs, and show us his grace and favour, for surely he will not hide himself from his own flesh, Isa. lviii. 7. This wonderfully reconcileth the heart of man to God, and maketh our thoughts of him more comfortable, and doth encourage us to free access to God.

2. Come we now to the particular offices by which he performeth the work of a mediator, and they all show the necessity of both natures: these offices and functions are those of prophet, priest, and king.

[1.] Our mediator hath a prophetical office belonging to his administration, that he may be made wisdom to us, and therefore he must be both God and man. God, that he may not only teach us outwardly, as an ordinary messenger or minister, but inwardly, putting his law into our minds, and writing it upon our hearts: Heb. viii. 10, and 2 Cor. iii. 3, ‘Ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in the fleshly tables of the heart.’ Men may be the instruments, but Christ is the author of this grace, and therefore he must be God. To convince men’s understandings of their duty, and to incline their hearts to perform it, requireth no less than a divine power. If such an infinite virtue be necessary to cure the blindness of the body; how much more to cure the natural blindness and darkness of the mind! A man he must also be; for the great prophet of the church was to be raised up among his brethren like unto Moses, Deut. xviii. 15. Till such an one came into the world, they were to hear Moses; but then they were to hearken to him. He that was to come was to be a lawgiver as Moses was, but of a far more absolute and perfect law—a lawgiver that must match and overmatch Moses every way. He was to be a man as Moses was in respect of our infirmities, such an one as Moses was whom the Lord had known face to face; but of a far more divine nature, and approved to the world by miracles, signs, and wonders, as Moses was. Again, it was prophesied of him that, as the great prophet of the world, he should be anointed, that he might come and preach the gospel to the poor, Isa. lxii. 1; which could not be if he had spoken from heaven in thunder, and not as a man conversed with men. Again, he was to approve himself as one who had grace poured into his lips, Ps. xlv. 2; that all might wonder at the gracious speeches that came from his mouth, as they did at Christ’s. In short, that Wisdom of the Father, which was wont to assume some visible shape for a time, when he would instruct the patriarchs concerning his will, that he might hide his majesty and put a veil upon his glory, was now to assume our nature into the unity of his person, not a temporary and vanishing appearance; that ‘God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, might in these last days speak to us by his Son,’ Heb. i. 1, 2. Then God delivered his will by parcels, now by him he would settle the whole frame of the gospel.

[2.] Jesus Christ, as he is the apostle of our profession, so also he is the high priest, Heb. iii. 1, and so must be both God and man. Man, that he might be made sin for us; God, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him, 2 Cor. v. 21. Man, to undertake our redemption; God, to perform it. Man, that he might suffer; God, that he might satisfy by suffering and make our atonement full—we are purchased by the blood of God. Man, that he might have a sacrifice to offer; God, that the offering might be of an infinite price and value, Heb. ix. 14. Man, that he might have a life to lay down for us; God, that the power of laying it down and taking it up again might be in his own hands: John x. 17, 18, ‘I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.’ This was fit that his suffering should be a pure voluntary act, required, indeed, by God, but not enforced by man. He had a liberty, at his own pleasure, as to anything men could do, and thereby commendeth his love to sinners. What shall I say? He was man that he might die; he was God that by death he might destroy him that had the power of death. He was man, that by his death he might ratify the new covenant; God, that he might convey to the heirs of promise these precious legacies of pardon and life. Man, that he might be a merciful high priest, touched with the feeling of our infirmities; God, that we, coming boldly to the throne of grace, might find mercy and grace to help in every time of need, Heb. iv. 15, 16.

[3.] His kingly office. He that was to be King of kings and Lord of lords needed to be both God and man. God, that he might cast out the prince of this world, and having rescued his church from the power of darkness, might govern it by his word and Spirit, and finally present it to himself a glorious church, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. Man he needed to be for his own glory, ‘that he might be the first-born among many brethren.’—and head and members might suit, and be all of a piece,—and for our consolation, that we might be heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ, Rom. viii. 17,—and for the greater terror and ignominy of Satan, that the seed of the woman might break the serpent’s head. In short, God, that he might govern and influence a people so scattered abroad upon the face of the earth, and raise them up at the last day; man, that our nature (the dignity of which was so envied by Satan) might be exalted at the right hand of Majesty, and placed so near God, far above the angelical.

Thirdly, With respect to the persons who are to be considered and concerned in Christ’s mediation: God, to whom we are redeemed; Satan, from whom we are redeemed; and we ourselves who are the redeemed of the Lord. And you shall see, with respect to God, with respect to Satan, with respect to ourselves, our Mediator ought to be both God and man.

1. God he need to be. With respect to God, that he may be appeased by a valuable compensation given to his justice. No mere man could satisfy the justice of God, appease his wrath, procure his favour; therefore our surety needed to be God to do this. And with respect to Satan, that he might be overcome. Now none can bind the strong one and take away his goods but he that is stronger than he, Luke xi. 21. Now no mere man is a match for Satan; the conqueror of the devil must be God, that by strong hand he may deliver us from his tyranny. And with respect to man, that he may be saved. Not only because of the two former respects must he be God, but also there is a special reason in the cause—the two former respects evince it; for unless God be appeased, man cannot be reconciled, and unless the devil be overcome, man cannot be delivered. If a God be needful for that, man cannot be saved unless our Redeemer be God; but there is a special reason, because of our own obstinacy and rebellion, which is only overcome by the divine power. It is necessary man should be converted and changed, as well as God satisfied and Satan overcome. Now who can convert himself or change his own heart? That work would cease for ever unless God did undertake it by his all-conquering Spirit. Therefore our Mediator must be God, to renew and cleanse our hearts, and by his divine power to give us a divine nature.

2. Man also he ought to be with respect to these three parties: With respect to God, that the satisfaction might be tendered in the nature which had sinned, that ‘as by man came death, by man also might come the resurrection from the dead,’ 1 Cor. xv. 21, 22; that ‘as in Adam all die, so by Christ shall all be made alive.’ So with respect to the devil, that he might be overcome in the nature that was foiled by his temptations. And with respect to us, that ‘he that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified, might be of one,’ Heb. ii. 11. The priest that wrought the expiation, and the people for whom it was wrought, were of one stock; the right of redeeming belonged to the next kinsman. Christ is our Goel who redeemed us, not only jure proprietatis, as his creatures—to God as God—but jure propinquitatis, as his kinsmen. So as man we are of kin to him, as he came in our nature, and as he sanctifieth; doubly akin, not only by virtue of his incarnation but our regeneration, as he was made of a woman, and we born of God. These are the reasons.

Use. Let me press you to admire this mystery of godliness. The man Christ Jesus in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwelt bodily. The life and strength of our faith depends upon it, for as he is true man, flesh of our flesh, and bone of our bone, he will not be strange to us, and as he is God, he is able to help us.

Two things I will press you to:—

1. Consider what a fit object he is for your faith to close with.

2. Own him as your Lord and your God.

First, To raise your trust and confidence, consider what a fit object he is for your faith, how he is qualified for all his offices of prophet, priest, and king.

SERMON VIII.

And having made peace by the blood of his cross, to reconcile all things to himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.—Col. I. 20.

IN these words observe:—

First, What Christ was to do.

Secondly, The manner how he did it; or,

First, The end for which he was appointed. To be our Mediator and Redeemer, and accordingly promised and sent into the world to reconcile all things to God, ‘Whether they be things in heaven, or things in earth.’

Secondly, The means by which he accomplished it: ‘Having made peace by the blood of his cross;’ that is, by his bloody sacrifice on the cross, thereby answering the sacrifices of atonement under the law. In the first branch take notice of:—

1. The benefit: reconciliation with God.

2. The person procuring it: by him; and it is repeated again, I say, by him.

3. The persons to whom this benefit is intended, expressed—

[1.] Collectively, πάντα, all things.

[2.] Distributively: whether they be things in earth or things in heaven.

As they are collectively expressed, it teaches us that grace is revealed and offered in the most comprehensive expressions, that none may be excluded, or have just cause to exclude themselves. As it is distributively expressed, the latter clause is of a dubious interpretation. Some ‘by things on earth,’ understand men, but by ‘things in heaven’ the angels. Surely not the fallen angels, for they are not in heaven, neither was Christ sent to reconcile them, nor relieve them in their misery and reduce them to God, Heb. ii. 16, οὐκ ἐπιλαμβάνεται τῶν ἀγγέλων. What then shall we understand by ‘things in heaven’? Some think the holy angels, others the glorified saints. (1.) Those that assert the first argue thus: that the angels are properly inhabitants of heaven, and so fitly called things in heaven; and they are enemies to men whilst they are ungodly, idolatrous, and rebels to God (as good subjects hold with their prince, and have common friends and enemies with him), but are reconciled to them as soon as they partake of the benefits of Christ’s death, as we are told of ‘joy in heaven among the angels of God, at the conversion of one sinner.’ Luke xv. 10. Now if there be so much joy over one sinner repenting, how much more when many sinners are snatched out of the jaws of hell? They make the sense to be thus: before, for the sins of men, they were alienated from them, but then reconciled. But this scripture speaks not of the reconciliation of angels and men, but the reconciliation of all things to God; for so it is expressly in the text, to reconcile all things to himself. Now the good angels cannot be said to be reconciled to God, for there was never a breach between them, Se nunquam cum matre in gratiam rediisse. (2.) Therefore, I interpret it of the glorified saints. See the like expression, Eph. i. 10, ‘To gather together in one all things to Christ which are in heaven and in earth.’ And more clearly, Eph. iii. 15, ‘Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named.’ Meaning thereby the faithful who are already in heaven, and those who are now remaining upon earth. This is a comfortable note, and teaches us:—

1. That the apostle Paul knew no purgatory, or third place for souls after death.

2. That the saints departed are now in heaven as to their souls, and gathered to the rest of the spirits of just men made perfect.

3. The souls now in heaven once needed the merit of Christ, even as we do. None come thither but they were first reconciled to God. By him their peace was made, and they obtained remission of sins by the blood of his cross, as ye do. In short, all that go to heaven go thither by the mediation, sacrifice, and meritorious righteousness of the same Redeemer.

Doct. One great benefit we have by Christ is peace and reconciliation with God. Here I shall show:—

1. What this reconciliation is.

2. How it was obtained.

3. What assurance we have that it is obtained.

4. How and upon what terms it is applied to us.

1. What this reconciliation is.

I answer: It is not an original peace, but a returning to amity after some foregoing breach. Now the breach by sin consisted in two things—an aversion of the creature from God, and an aversion of God from the creature. So before peace and reconciliation can be made, two things must be removed—God’s wrath, and our sinful nature: God must be pacified, and man converted. God’s wrath is appeased by the blood of Christ, and our natures are changed and healed by the Spirit of grace. First, God’s wrath is appeased, and then the Spirit is bestowed upon us; for while God is angry and offended, no saving benefit can be expected from him. This text speaks not how he took away our enmity, but how he appeased God for us, not so much of the application as the impetration of this benefit. The application is spoken of ver. 21, how it is applied to us, but here the apostle more directly speaks of the impetration, how it was procured and obtained for us namely, by Christ’s satisfying God’s justice for that wrong which caused the breach, or the dying of the Son of God for a sinful world. Now this hath an influence on God’s pardon and our conversion, for by virtue of this reconciliation we are justified and pardoned. Therefore, we are said to be justified by his blood, Rom. viii. 9, that is, the price is paid by Christ and accepted by God. There needeth nothing more to be done on the Mediator’s part. By virtue of the same peace made we are also sanctified and converted unto God, 2 Cor. v. 18. The gift of the sanctifying Spirit is given us as the fruit of Christ’s death.

2. How it was obtained—by the blood of his cross he made peace. This implieth death, and such a death as in appearance was accursed; for the death of the cross is the vilest and most cruel death: Gal. iii. 13, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made accursed for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.’ Now we must see the reasons of this course or way of reconciling the world, that we may not mistake God’s design, nor be possessed with any imaginations which are derogatory to God’s honour—as, suppose, if we should hence conceit that God is all wrath and justice, unwilling of himself to be reconciled to man, or that he delighteth in blood, and is hardly drawn to give out grace. Oh, no! these^are false misprisions and misrepresentations of God. Therefore let us a little inquire into the reasons why God took this way to reconcile all things to himself, and ordained Christ to bear the chastisement of our peace. I answer: That the justice of God might be eminently demonstrated, the law giver vindicated, and the breach that was made in the frame of government repaired; and God manifested to be a hater of sin, and yet the sinner saved from destruction; and that the love of God might be eminently and conspicuously discerned; and our peace the better secured. As let us a little see these things more particularly. I begin—

[1.] With the holiness of God’s nature, who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, Hab. i. 13,—that is, so as to approve of it, or altogether connive at it, so as to let it go without punishment or mark of his displeasure; therefore some way must be found out to signify his purest holiness, and his hatred and detestation of sin, and that it should not be pardoned without some testimony of his displeasure against it. We are told God hateth the workers of iniquity, Ps. v. 5, and the righteous Lord loveth righteousness, Ps. xi. 7; and, therefore, when God was to grant his universal pardon he would not do it without this propitiatory atonement.

[2.] The honour of his governing justice was to be secured, and freed from any blemish, that the awe of God might be kept up in the world. In the mystery of our redemption we must not look upon God only as pars laesa, the wronged party; but as rector mundi. God was to carry himself as the governor of the world. Now there is a difference between a private person and a governor—private persons may pass by offences as they please, but a governor must do right, and what conduces to the public good. There is a twofold notion that we have of public right, justum est quod fieri debet, and justum est quod fieri potest. That which ought to be done, or we are unjust; as for instance, to punish the righteous equally with the wicked, that Abraham pleadeth, Gen. xviii. 25, ‘That be far from thee, to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked, and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that be far from thee. Shall not the judge of all the earth do right?’ Not that Abraham mindeth God of his office, but he was confidently assured of the nature of God that he could not do otherwise. But now there is justum quod fieri potest, which if it be done, or if it be not done, the party is not unjust. The first part of justice is paying of debts; the second, exacting or requiring of debts. Now the Judge of the world doth all things wisely and righteously. The question is, therefore, whether God, passing by the offences of the world without any satisfaction required, doth deal justly? As a free Lord he may make what laws he pleases; but as a just Judge, with respect to the ends of government, he doth that which is for public good. The right of passing by a wrong, and the right of releasing a punishment, are different things; because punishment is a common interest, and is referred to a common good to preserve order and government, and for example to the future. The government of the world required it that God should stand on the satisfaction of Christ, and the submission of the sinner, that he may be owned and reverenced as the just and holy governor of the world. A valuable compensation is insisted on for this end: Rom. ii. 25, 26, ‘Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God. To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness, that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.’

[3.] To keep up the authority of his law. God had made a former covenant, which was not to be quitted and wholly made void but upon valuable consideration; therefore if it be broken, and no more ado made about it, all respect and obedience to God would fall to the ground. The law may be considered either as to the precept or sanction. The authority of the precept is kept up by Christ’s submission to the law, and living by the same rules we are bound to live by, and performing all manner of obedience to God; for it behoved him to fulfil all righteousness, Mat. iii. 15, being set up as a pattern of holiness in our nature, to which we are to be conformed. But that which is most considerable in this case is the sanction or penalty. If this should be relaxed, and no satisfaction required, it might leave upon God the blemish of levity, mutability, and inconstancy. The law was not given in jest, but in the greatest earnest that ever law was given; and so solemn a transaction was not constituted to no purpose, therefore God will not part with the law upon light terms: Gal. iv. 4, 5, ‘When the fulness of time was come, God sent forth his Son made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law.’ That men may know that it is a dangerous thing to transgress his law, and that they may fear and do no more presumptuously; partly that it might not foster in us hopes of impunity, which are very natural to us, Gen. iii. 5. The devil seeks to weaken the truth of God’s threatenings, Deut. xxix. 19, 20. We are apt to look upon the threatenings of the law as a vain scarecrow; therefore, for the terror and warning of sinners for the future, God would not release us from the punishment till our surety undertook our reconciliation with God by bearing the chastisement of our peace.

[4.] Christ’s death was necessary to make sin odious, and obedience more acceptable to us.

(1.) Sin more odious or hateful—no other remedy would serve the turn to procure the pardon and destruction of it than the bloody death of the cross, Rom. viii. 3. Surely it is no small thing for which the Son of God must die. When you read or hear of Christ’s sufferings, you should never think an extenuating and favourable thought of it more.

(2.) To commend obedience: for Christ’s suffering death at the command of his Father was the noblest piece of service, and highest act of obedience that ever could or can be performed unto God. It is beyond anything that can be done by men or angels. There was in it so much love to man, so much self-denial, humility, and patience, so much resignation of himself to God, who had appointed him to be our Redeemer, that it cannot be paralleled. The great and most remarkable thing in Christ’s death was obedience: Rom. v. 18; Phil. ii. 7, 8. God delighteth not in mere blood, but blood offered in obedience as the best way to impress upon man a sense of his duty, and to teach him to serve and please God at the dearest rate.

[5.] This death commendeth the love of God to us, for it is the great demonstration of it. Many draw a quite contrary conclusion, as if he were with much ado brought to have mercy on us; but they forget that he is first and chief in the design: 2 Cor. v. 19, ‘God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself.’ Christ came from heaven to declare to us the greatness of God’s love. God thought nothing too dear for us—not the Son of his love, nor his death, ignominy, and shame: Rom. v. 8, God commendeth his love in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. When we had alienated our hearts from God, refused his service, and could expect nothing but the rigour of his law and vindictive justice, then he spared not his own Son to bring about this reconciliation for us.

[6.] As God is pacified, so it gives us hopes our business lieth not with a God offended, but with a God reconciled. If we had not to do with a pacified God, who could lift up his face to him, or think a comfortable thought of him? But this gives us hope: Rom. v. 10, ‘For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.’ We were enemies by sin in us, which God hateth, and declareth his wrath against it in the law. Then by the satisfaction wrought by Christ we were restored to his favour, so far that free and easy conditions were procured in the gospel, and his Spirit is offered to prepare and fit us for a life of glory. We have heard what Christ hath done.

Thirdly, What assurance have we that this peace is obtained? Consciences are not easily settled, therefore some visible evidences are necessary that God is pacified. I shall name three or four:—

1. Christ’s resurrection and ascension into glory. This shows that God was propitiated, and hath accepted the ransom that was given for souls. We read, Rom. iv. 25, that he died for our offences, and rose again for our justification. His dying noteth his satisfaction, his rising again the acceptance of it. God by raising him up from the dead showed that he had received the death of his Son as a sufficient ransom for our sins—for he died in the quality of a surety, and in that quality was raised up again. By his death he made the payment; by his resurrection the satisfaction of it was witnessed to the world—for then our surety was let out of prison: Isa. liii. 8, ‘He shall be taken from prison and from judgment.’ In his death he was in effect a prisoner, under the arrest of divine vengeance; but when he rose again he was discharged. Therefore there is great weight laid upon it as to our acquittance: Rom. viii. 34, ‘Yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God.’ There is some special thing in his resurrection comparatively above his death which hath influence on our justification—that is, it was a visible evidence given to the world that enough was done for the expiation of sins, and to assure us of our deliverance if we be capable; and his ascension into glory doth further witness it. He being exalted to the greatest dignity, is able to defend and protect his people, and hath the advantage of interceding with his Father for the supply of all our wants.

2. The grant of the new covenant—which is therefore called the covenant of his peace: Isa. liv. 10, ‘The covenant of my peace shall not be removed;’ Ezek. xxxvii. 26, ‘I will make a covenant of peace with them.’ It is so called not only because thereby this peace and reconciliation is offered to us, but the terms are stated, and the conditions required are far more equitable, gracious, and commodious for us than the terms of the law covenant. Man, as a sinful creature, is obnoxious to God’s wrath for the violation of the law of nature, and so might perish without remedy, and no impeachment to God’s goodness can happen thereby. But when God will give bounds to his sovereignty over him, and enter into terms of covenant with him, and give him a bottom to stand upon, whereon to expect good things from him, upon the account of his faithfulness and righteousness—this is a condescension; and so far condescended in the first covenant, that after that man hath cast away the mercies of his creation, and his capacity to fulfil that covenant, this was mere mercy and grace. That God would enter into a second covenant, it is not from any mutableness in God, but from the merit and satisfaction of a Redeemer. Surely there must be some great and important cause to change, alter, and abrogate a covenant so solemnly made and established—to lay aside one covenant, and to enter into another, especially since the former was so holy, righteous, and equal, fit for God to give, and us, in the state we then were in, to receive. Now, what was the important reason? Christ came to salve God’s honour in the first covenant, and to secure the ends of his government. Though a second covenant should be set up, the blood of his cross hath made this covenant everlasting, Heb. xiii. 20, and upon gracious terms doth convey great and precious privileges to us.