-- CHAPTER VII: The security that Jesus Christ gives us to be strengthened, and enabled to persevere
that, at the judgment ended, thou mayest assuredly expect that blessed voice and invitation from him amongst the rest of saints,
Mat. 25:34, 'Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.'
CHAPTER VII
The security that Jesus Christ gives us, as well as God the Father, to assure our faith that we shall be strengthened, and enabled to persevere.—God is a God of all grace to us by Jesus Christ; all his acts of grace towards us are in and through him.—He elected us at first, and then, loved us only as considered in him.—He loved and chose him for himself, and us for his sake. God having thus laid Christ as the mediator, or rather as the foundation of his grace, it is a sure ground of its continuance to us.—All his purposes of grace were made in him.—All his promises of grace are established and performed in and through him.
By Jesus Christ.—1 PET. 5:10.
There are two persons engaged for preservation of us unto glory, God the Father, and Jesus Christ, which was the general division I gave at the entrance. I have despatched those securities, which the interest that God the Father hath in us doth afford our faith. I come now to Jesus Christ, and the interest that he hath herein, which, added to the former, will afford us complete consolation.
And truly let me say this of him, as the preface to what follows, that if he be good for any thing (as he is for all things), he is certainly good at this, to make our salvation sure and stedfast against all opposition, it being founded on him, and committed to him. He is a sure Christ— a rock of ages to build upon: Isa. 28:16, 'Behold, I lay in Sion,' saith
the Lord God, 'for a foundation a stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth on him shall not make haste;' that is, 'not to be confounded,' as 1 Pet. 2:6 expounds it to be.
By Christ Jesus. The aspect and extent of these words to the rest in the test is the only thing as for explanation afore me, which I shall despatch briefly.
Some interpreters would shut up the extent of it unto the influence Christ hath into eternal glory, because that was the thing had been immediately afore spoken of. Others do permit them to stretch themselves farther, unto the words foregoing, 'who hath called us by Jesus Christ;' and so to take in the influence Christ hath in calling us.
But let the wings of this 'Sun of righteousness' spread themselves so far through the horizon of this text, as possibly from warrant from other scriptures they may be found efficacious to extend, even from the first words, 'The God of all grace,' as also unto the latter words, the utmost ends of the text.
1. Put (say I) 'the God of all grace' and 'by Jesus Christ' together, and understand it as interpreted, that clause at the first, as of God's purposes and dispensations of grace to us-ward; and so it will be no derogation to God the Father to say, and say aloud, that he is a God of grace, yea, of all grace, towards us, in and by Christ Jesus. God his
Father, the God of grace, and Jesus Christ, do run one joint stock and interest in all and every act of grace.
2. Put together 'who hath called us by Jesus Christ,' understanding calling to be that which Christ hath an hand and influence in, as well as his Father. Thus Rom. 1:6, 'The called of Jesus Christ.'
3. Then further say that the God of grace, by calling us, doth estate us into the full right to glory; but withal add, that he doth it by Jesus
Christ. 'The gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord,'
Rom. 6:23.
Then, 4, carry them unto the words that follow after, 'the same God will stablish, strengthen, settle you'; and therein take along with you
'by Jesus Christ,' too, and Christ to be, as the author and founder of our faith in calling, so the finisher of our faith unto the end thereof,
'even the salvation of our souls; 'or if you desire rather to have it confirmed to you, in the very word of the text, stablish you, take it from 2 Cor. 1:21, 'Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God.' So then, God, in and by Christ (as here), strengthens, stablisheth.
And therefore it is that by Jesus Christ is placed in the midst, as the sun, to extend its influence unto all; and read but the words thus,
'The God of of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory.'
And so make a colon or stop, or part the sentence there, and by Jesus Christ will, without any rub to the reader's thoughts, take in and spread itself over all these. The God of grace; the God of all grace; &c.
You know the way and course I have run in handling each of the former words have been, 1. To handle the doctrinal part that each word in their coherence affordeth.
2. To shew how each of those doctrinals do make good this main inference, viz., a security to us that we shall be carried on to the end,
&c. I must, in like manner, follow the same method in handling these words, which convene about Christ's interest, and shall make that main inference that God will stablish us, and I shall intermix it with the handling of those first three heads mentioned, at the end and application of each and every of those doctrinals that follow, for it is as the burden of everything in this discourse.
Now, as touching my making out this high engagement of Jesus Christ's in this matter, there are four doctrinal propositions that come round about and cleave to this clause, as broken pieces of steel would do to a loadstone.
1. That God is a God of grace, yea, of all grace, by Jesus Christ.
2. I shall consider Christ's person, office, and relation to us, in this distinction which is here set out, 1, as Christ; 2, as Jesus. 'By Christ
Jesus,' saith the text. And the distinct influence, that each of these have into our salvation, will contribute something apart unto this security or stedfastness of our faith herein.
3. The engagement and interest of Christ to carry us through, as it ariseth from this, that he hath called us, and that God hath called us by Jesus Christ.
4. The interest that Christ hath in that glory into which the Father hath called us by him; 'who hath called us into eternal glory by Jesus
Christ.' In which glory of ours, and our being brought into it, Christ having an hand as well as the Father; from thence doth a great interest and concernment of his lie, to see to the preservation, and strengthening, and perfecting of us to the end, as well as the Father.
There are a multitude of other considerations might be drawn from Christ, to infer this main conclusion; but these are natural and proper to the text, and I confine myself to them, and them alone.
1. That God is a God of grace, yea, of all grace, to us, by Jesus Christ.
God forbid I should say, or you understand, as if God were not a God of all grace, as in himself, in his nature, or essentially, or that he were so only by Jesus Christ. The man Jesus adds nothing unto him at all.
'My righteousness extendeth not unto thee,' says Christ unto his Father,' Ps. 16:2. But this it is I affirm, that it is by Jesus Christ he is such a God to us. When I handled that part, 'The God of all grace,' I gave this distinction how he was the God of all grace,
1. Essentially in his nature.
2. In respect of his purposes of grace.
And 3. In his dispensations unto us.
Now this is that I here affirm, that all his purposes of grace, and all his dispensations of grace, they are all in and by Jesus Christ. He would not have been a God of grace, much less of all grace to us, but for and through Jesus Christ. And for a general proof of this, look, as he is here said to be the 'God of all grace, by Jesus Christ,' so elsewhere, that all the blessings which, Rom. 5:15–17, are styled 'the gifts by grace,' or which grace bestows, these are all said to be in and by Jesus Christ. Nay, there is no act of God's, either immanent in his own heart or breast, or purposes towards us, or transient, and emanant of himself, conferred upon us, but he hath founded it and seated it in Jesus Christ. Eph. 1:3, 'Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places, in Christ.' So in general he enumerates the particulars, even from that of choosing us in him, which was an immanent act in him, ver. 4, unto our obtaining an inheritance in him, ver. 11. And whilst he says all blessings in general, and then gives a bill of the chiefest and greatest particulars of those blessings, and that they are all the blessings of grace, as ver. 6, 'to the praise of the glory of his grace,' and so on in the rest of the verses. Look how far the grace of God extends, so far doth the influence by Christ extend; Christ is left out in none. We owe all to God, and we owe all to Christ. As God is in his grace 'all in all,' so 'Christ is all in all,' Col.
3:11.
I use to say, free grace, Christ, and faith in us, are adequate; that is, 1, there is no blessing that free grace hath to bestow, but it hath given and bequeathed it to the elect sons of men. 2. There was nothing free grace had designed and given, but Christ comes as the medium, the instrument of it, and is God's perfect servant to accomplish it. 3.
There is nothing wherein God's free grace towards us hath manifested itself, or wherein Christ hath any way appeared, but that principle of faith in us is fitted to apprehend it, and to take it in, in such a manner as to give both free grace and Christ the right and proper glory, according unto the way of God's grace and intention
therein, which no grace in us else was fitted to do; like as no sense but the eye is fitted to take in all the visible world at once.
I divided this first head into two propositions.
1. That the very grace and love he shews us, was placed upon our persons as we were considered in Christ; God did never love us out of him, yea, and all his love is through him. I grant that Christ, considered as Mediator or God-man, was not the motive that swayed
God, why he chose these and these persons, and not others. In that respect it is that Christ says, 'Thine they were.' Yet I say that God no sooner thought of choosing and loving any so, but that the love in solido he resolved to convey upon them was in Christ. He had Christ, not only as Mediator, in his eye, in whom he chose us then; or, that Christ, as Mediator, was considered at and with the election, and as in whom we were chosen, so as we were not considered out of him when chosen, which is express: Eph. 1:4–6, 'According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will; to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.' We were not only elected cum Christo, together with Christ, but in Christo, in Christ when elected. And not only the benefits which we by election were predestinated unto, but election itself, as a distinct benefit, is made one of the first of blessings which in Christ, ver. 3, we are blessed withal: 'He hath blessed us with all blessings in Christ, according as he hath chosen us,' ver. 4. But I would say farther, that the love, or grace, which in electing was the fountain of all those benefits, was in and with the love he loved Christ withal, he being
'the beloved,' in whom God graciously accepts or loves us, ver. 6.
Which I farther make out thus.
Christ being his natural Son, he loves him indeed immediately for himself, and chose him simply for himself; who is therefore styled by God the Father, in a way of singularity, both 'mine elect,' and also 'in
whom my soul delighteth' (Isa. 42:1), that is, delighteth in him for himself; for though the man Jesus, by personal union, became his natural Son, and so beloved for himself, yet that this man should have this dignity was from God's having elected him, and thereunto that speech in Isaiah is interpreted by God himself from heaven:
Mat. 3:17, 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.'
Which two, both of his elected and beloved, Christ hath a respect unto in citing that place of Isaiah, Mat. 12:18, 'Behold my servant, whom I have chosen, my beloved, in whom I am well pleased.' And then God himself again, Mat. 17:5, in repeating his former words, adds, 'Hear him,' which was as if he had said, With him my soul is pleased, as my Son in himself, but in you only through him; and that he was only elected for himself, for God to delight in, and who became the immediate receptacle of all the love of God, and we but elected in him because beloved in him; and so he was both caput electionis, the head of election, and caput dilectionis, the head of being beloved. And it is certain, that he that is the one, is and must be the other; he that is head or first receptacle of all God's love for himself, must needs be the head of electing, or of the estating the whole of God's love upon others.
And truly, if we farther consider the infinite distance that is between God and mere single creatures, that are but nothing, they were not meet and fit matches (in themselves) or objects for his so immediate love, as with and by election is bestowed on them, and is as the original of all the benefits and purposes of God therein. Nor, perhaps, could the creature have borne the weight of such an one singly themselves alone, no, not the angels, immediately, as they cannot bear his wrath; and therefore it was transmitted through his first beloved, who was able. Hence, therefore, God met those that were to be mere creatures half the way, and descended and came down into the man Jesus, who by personal union was made more than a creature, and then God could pour out his love, in the fulness of it, on us. But the chief of the reason lies in this, that God, of whom were all things else, and in his counsels were ordered in a due number, and weight, and measure by him, he did observe in this of
electing a dueness or comely proportion, and it became him thus to love mere creatures in another, whom he should have cause to love for himself, and who, when chosen, was worthy of it; yea, and chosen for his own delight first, and by him to estate them into that his transcendent love, and to give them a right unto it as to glory. This was a most wise and orderly ordination, I might shew out of John
17:23, 'I in them, and thou in me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me.' Whereas other creatures he loves, but because they are his creatures, and that he made them, and artifew amat opus; this to shew the peculiarity and transcendency of it, it is a love borne us in Christ, and a loving us as he loved him, yet for his sake. And this for the first, that he is a God of grace to us in Christ.
2. Now, secondly, as to the main conclusion, that therefore we shall be invincibly carried on to glory, you find the fixedness of God's love put upon this very thing: 'Rom. 8:39, 'Who shall separate us from the love of God?' He stops not here, but adds, 'which is in Jesus Christ.'
And it is there added as the ground of its unchangeableness, over and above God's love in predestinating of us, of the which he had before abundantly discoursed in that chapter, ver. 29, 30, and 33: 'For 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. Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called; and whom he called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified.' The love he bears to Christ is such, and so unto us as beloved in him, it is so strong and prevalent. And it is as if he had said, Although God's love would have been of itself unchangeable, and most constant unto those it should fix upon, yet God thought meet to take in Christ his Son, and to put him as a medium, or midst, or, if you will use Isaiah's word (for we cannot have a fitter), laid him as a foundation first, and a sure foundation between his grace and us; as for other ends, so on purpose for this, that his grace, in all the emanation of it, might have a just and consistent ground and foundation for the continuance thereof to us,
that as there might be a sureness of his good pleasure in his own heart, so of dueness and equitableness in it upon which that unchangeableness should be grounded, in our being loved, not in ourselves (which was creation love by works), but in his Beloved, wholly out of us, as even that love of his had no respect at all to what was in us, but it was purely in his own heart, and now founded on our relation to his Son.
II. As he is a God of grace to us in Christ, so he is a God of all grace to us in Christ.
For, 1, take all the purposes of God's heart towards us, which were the first bubblings up of grace and of love in his will, as from the spring, and which were the matrix, the womb, the mother, in which calling and perseverance and all lay. Now although, in the first of the Ephesians, he is said to have purposed all in himself, ver. 9 and 11, ex mero motu, yet chap, 3:11 withal telleth us that his 'eternal purposes' towards his church and calling the Gentiles, whereof he had spoken, ver. 8–10, were 'purposed in Jesus Christ;' nay, the original hath it, ἣν ἐποίησεν, which he 'made, contrived, or framed in Jesus Christ;' even as well as we are said to be 'his workmanship in Christ.' They had a foundation, as in God's heart, so in his Christ's, and they are the whole of his everlasting purposes he speaks of, πρόθεσιν τῶν αἰώνων, the purposes of eternity, the purpose or purposes of ages, as from everlasting and to everlasting they have their firmitude, their subsistence from him.
And that God made all his purposes in Christ, hence it is that firmness and sureness accrued to them. Christ strengthened God's heart in them, and his hand (he being God's arm, Isa. 53:1) to perform them; and surely, if he served to fix God's heart in them, then the faith and consideration of his engagement in them may well serve to secure, fix, and stablish ours. And particularly, perseverance was one great design of God amongst the rest, as hath been shewn.
2. Take all the promises, which are the adequate, indefinite expressions of God's purposes, and the channels or cisterns all his purposes run out into, and as God is (as he is styled here) a God of all grace, so the promises, what are they but the contents of all and every of that grace, whereof those of keeping us and preserving us are an eminent part? and these also have a firmitude, a sureness given them in and by Christ. And although God's bare promise, and his oath added thereto, are said to be two immutable things, Heb.
6:18, which do shew 'the immutability of his counsel' to the heirs of the promise, 'that they might have strong consolation,' and have an 'anchor of hope sure and stedfast' (that is, of stedfastness against all temptations, storms, and tempests that threaten casting us away, as the allusion of casting anchor doth withal import); I say although his promise and oath were alone sufficient, and indeed either of them, as the apostle there implies, yet his Christ comes in also as a third, to add a farther immutability to them. yea, to each of them.
(1.) To make all the promises sure: 2 Cor. 1:20, 'All the promises of God in him are yea, and in him amen.' He is God's yea, and he is
God's amen. When God made all, or any of his promises, Christ stood by, and said amen to them first, or they had never been promulged to us; and that to affirm this is no derogation unto God, that which follows, as if to prevent any such an imagination, is added, 'unto the glory of God.' For it is God's glory that he should have a Son, so great a Son, as in the very words afore, ver. 19, he had on purpose styled him, 'the Son of God, Jesus Christ,' who is always the same, and whose years fail not, Heb. 1:12. In him was and is God's yea founded.
You may build on him. For an instance of all other promises, the yea and amen particularly gives this for all the rest, even in the very word this my text useth: ver. 21, 'Now he which stablisheth us in Christ is
God.' God stablisheth, but in his Christ. And 'the God that hath called you by Christ, shall stablish you by Christ,' saith the text here.
(2.) Then, secondly, Christ comes in to make his oath sure (which was the second); but that will pass into a third particular, wherein
God is a God of all grace.
(3.) In his performances, to assure us of which his oath was added to his promise, and Christ comes in to both, as undertaking the performance of all. Though his oath made all sure, yet even the performance of that oath depended upon our Christ to make good.
Now look into Zacharias's song, Luke 1, which was made upon occasion of Christ's being born a Saviour; 'Blessed be God,' says he,
'who hath raised up an horn of salvation for us;' that is, Christ a strong Saviour; and to what end it is that Christ comes in, verse 73 tells us, 'To perform the oath which he sware to our father Abraham, that he would grant unto us.' And it is Christ, you see, that must perform all, and the sending of him was the great matter of God's oath. And last of all, the very point we alleged all for, and in the conclusion of all, is made the thing which God sware and Christ came to perform: ver. 74, 75, 'That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hands of our enemies, might serve him with[out] fear, in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life.' I might here insert a critical observation upon that very oath that God swore to Abraham, which we heard even now, the apostle also speaking of it: Heb. 6:17, ἐμεσίτευσεν ὅρκῳ, 'He mediated by an oath,' saith Paul there, so shewing that God in his very taking the oath had an eye to the Mediator, as in the intuition and contemplation of whom God took it and swore it, he it was that was to make it good. And to this sense the Greek Scholiast hath also interpreted it; and it is to be greatly heeded those words in Gen.
22:16, 'By myself have I sworn,' should have been rendered by the Chaldee paraphrast, 'By my word do I swear;' that is, by my Christ, who is the Word, as John after declared him. The oath of a king runs in the word of a king; God's oath runs higher, not barely in a verbal word, but in his Word, that is, Christ, his substantial Word, who is also God himself; 'for my name is in him,' says God to Moses; 'and by my Name have I sworn,' so the Syriac translation. The effect of all which comes to this, that in the virtue and strength of this my Son and my Christ, as a Mediator, and in whom is my name, it is that I do make this oath, and he shall see to perform it.
Thus much for the first general head, that he is a God of grace, and of all grace to us by Christ Jesus; and the inferences from thence to strengthen our faith in the main conclusion.