CHAPTER VIII: Uses:
for us; for Abraham's seed were all to be circumcised, and he that was circumcised was a debtor to the whole law: Gal. 5:3, 'For I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to do the whole law.' And so the law will take hold of him, and so hereby he was made under the law; and this was one reason why he was a male child also, for they only were circumcised. Thus you see Christ hereby engaged to keep the law for us, yea, to satisfy for sin; for the ceremonial law was a bond against us, which he must cancel and destroy.
CHAPTER VIII
The Uses.—Since God hath thus fitted us with a Mediator, we may be assured that he will fit us with all other things.—Let us choose Christ to be our only Saviour, and trust in none but him.—Is he God?—Let us not then fear or doubt.—Hath he taken our nature?—Let us admire his love in this, and consider our own privilege.—Let us endeavour to fit our natures all that we can for fellowship with him.
We will now come to uses of all this. And surely the doctrine of Christ will afford many; for his person is the most useful of any in heaven and earth. I deferred the uses until the last, that so you might view the frame of the doctrinal part, as set together without separation.
I. The first uses shall be from this, That God chose him to be mediator, because of his fitness above all other.
1. Hence learn and be assured, that that love which thus fitted thee with a Saviour, will much more fit thee with all other things which thou hast need of. Thou shalt have the fittest condition, the fittest calling, the fittest yoke-fellow, the fittest estate, 'food convenient,' as Agar speaks: God will fit thee in everything. Thus he sought out a 'meet help' for Adam, Gen. 2:20. The fulness of fitness in Christ to be a saviour is a pawn for fitting and suiting thee with all things else; for he that gave Christ gives all besides: Rom. 8:32, 'He that spared not
his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?' And believe that as all things do meet in Christ, and nothing is wanting that may make him a fit and meet saviour for thee, so all things shall conspire, all things shall suit and kiss each other; sins, afflictions, mercies, yea, all God's dealings shall work together for thy good. Be quiet therefore, and trust him in all; 'lean not,' as Solomon says, 'to thine own wisdom,' Prov. 3:5.
Thou knowest not what is fittest for thee, as the sons of Zebedee did not when they asked for a place that was not fit for them. The physician knows what is fit for his patient better than he himself does; and so does God. He takes measure of thy spirit, and knows the composition of it; and so orders his prescripts accordingly. We cannot judge what is fit for us, God only can. If thou hadst seen
Christ in the flesh, poor and despised (as he was whilst on earth), thy carnal heart would have judged sin as unlikely and as unfit a man to be the saviour of the world as the Jews did; Isa. 52:14, 'His countenance was so marred.' Thou wouldst never have thought that a carpenter's son should build God a church; that a man unlearned should be the prophet of God's people. The Jews refused him as an unfit stone to be laid in their building, whom God had yet hewn out on purpose, as being only fit to be made 'the head stone of the corner,' as a stone elect and precious: Isa. 28:16, 'Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste;' 1 Pet. 2:6, 7. And as much mistaken are men in judging of their own condition.
2. Is Christ every way so fit a saviour? Then choose him, and rest in him alone. It is necessary that a saviour you should have; for otherwise you perish; and it is as necessary that you should have
Jesus Christ, or else you must have none: for there is, there can be, no other. But yet, suppose you should have your choice of many, nay, suppose there were as many saviours as men to be saved (as many as the papists would make), yet he so transcends, that if ye all knew him, you would all make choice of him, and refuse all others. As 'who is a god like to our God?' so, who is a saviour like to our Saviour? Isa.
43:11, 'There is none besides him.' What do you therefore mean, to stand demurring and deliberating whether you should take him or no for your Lord and King, as the most men do? Do you look for any more such Christs, or can you have a better, a fitter saviour? Let this encourage you also to be willingly subject to him. What greater motive can there be to this, than that of all princes he is the fittest to be thy king (and none fit to be king of saints but he), and of all husbands he is the fittest to rule over thee? It grieves no man, nor do any think much to be subject to such a governor as all men with one consent acknowledge to be most fit for them: 'The people rejoice,' says Solomon, 'when the righteous are in authority,' Prov. 29:2. Now that the Lord Christ is King, 'let the earth rejoice, and the multitudes of the isles be glad,' Ps. 97:1.
II. The second sort of uses may be taken from this, that our saviour is God.
1. Is he who is thy saviour God? Then fear not to commit thyself to him. 'Thy God is thy saviour.' If 'God will justify' (though there were no mediator), 'who should lay anything to thy charge?' Rom. 8:33.
Surely none would open their mouths against you; 'The Lord that chooseth Jerusalem rebuke thee,' said the angel unto Satan, Zech.
3:2; but if God will also be thy mediator, and die for thee, then much more art thou safe: 'Who shall condemn?' as the apostle says, 'It is
Christ that died.' Do you know and consider who he is that died for you? It is even 'Christ that died,' Rom. 8:34; who in the beginning of the next chapter, he tells them, is 'God over all, blessed for ever.' 'In his days Judah shall be saved,' Jer. 23:6. It shall be so, says the prophet, 'for his name is Jehovah our righteousness.' 'Say to the feeble of heart, Fear not: for your God will save you,' Isa. 35:4. When princes will themselves in person go into the field, how doth it encourage their subjects and soldiers? Now Jesus Christ, who is God, came down into the field himself: 'Who is this that comes from Bozrah?' Isa. 63:1. 'It is I,' says Christ, 'that am mighty to save.' The heathens thought that if their gods should but come down, they were sure of the victory. Now God came down, and was found amongst us
as a man, and is become a 'Captain of salvation,' Heb. 2:10; therefore let fear have no entertainment with you.
Only in the second place, 2. If he be God; although this may raise your hearts not to fear discouragements (I speak to you whose hearts are set to be saved), yet it may withal strike the greatest and most awful dread upon your spirit, and provoke you to fear this your saviour, and not to deal presumptuously with him, nor to slight him, and play fast and loose with him, thinking you may have salvation at any time. No; he is
God; and 'God will not be mocked,' Gal. 6:7. You must carry yourselves towards him as towards God himself. Because Christ came to be a saviour, and hath a nature so full of meekness, therefore men think to deal with him as they please. But, as God elsewhere says, Ps. 46:10, 'Be still, and know that he is God.' Therefore, when
God sent him before the Israelites, Exod. 23:21, he bade them 'beware of him, and provoke him not; for,' says he, 'he will not pardon your transgressions' (that is, he will not pardon you upon any other than gospel terms and limits): 'for my name is in him:' that is, he is God as well as I, and therefore will not suffer you to lie in such sins as cannot stand with the rules in his word, and yet pardon you.
Think not to deal so with him. He will save you upon no other terms than I myself would by him. And therefore the apostle, when he had shewn how Christ was God as well as man, in the first and second chapters to the Hebrews, to the end that 'he might be a faithful high priest to God,' as well as 'a merciful high priest to men' (ver. 17 of the second chapter), that is, such a saviour as was not so made up all of mercy to men, but that withal he is as faithful to God. From this therefore the apostle in the third chapter makes this use, and bids them 'consider what an high priest they have' (ver. 1), who was and will be 'faithful to God that appointed him,' ver. 2. And he bids them to consider this, to this end, not to neglect the present opportunity of salvation, and think to put Christ off for the present, and come in to him when they please, in that he is so merciful a saviour. But (says he, ver. 7) consider, that as 'the Holy Ghost says, To-day, if ye will
hear his voice, harden not your hearts;' so take heed how there be in you an evil heart, to depart from him, he being 'the living God,' ver.
12. Remember how he dealt with the Israelites in the wilderness (his Father's name being in him), and how he sware against them, and said, 'They should not enter into his rest.' Read the whole chapter, and you will find this use made of it, as by the apostle elsewhere it is.
So, 1 Cor. 10:4, 5, 6, I would have you, brethren, says he, ver. 1, to consider that our fathers had Christ for their captain, as we have
(ver. 4), and they had him offered unto them in the ordinances; but they tempting him, 'with many of them God was not well pleased;' that is, Christ was not well pleased (for, ver. 9, they are said to have tempted Christ), and he, being God, 'destroyed them in the wilderness.' For in that he was God, he would not be so dealt withal by them. These things therefore are examples unto us (as he there concludes that discourse), that we may know and consider what a saviour we have to deal withal: who, as he is man (and therefore you might expect all mercy from him), so he is God also, and will be faithful unto God to save men, but this upon his Father's own conditions. And if we seek not salvation according to his own rules, he will take part with his Father against us, for his Father's name is in him. And yet, 3. Withal we may fetch this ground of encouragement against the guilt of great sins for time to come, that he is God, therefore able to pardon us. Were he mere man, though he had our nature, yet he would not endure us. So much mercy as serves to pardon us, never entered into the heart of any mere creature: 'I am God, not man, therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed.' But the human nature of Christ being united to the Son of God, his will in pardoning doth accompany the divine will, and goes along with it; and as in all acts else, so in forgiving, it is able to hold pace with him.
III. A third sort of uses are taken from this, that he who is God hath took our nature, our whole frail nature, unto himself, in that humbled way mentioned.
1. Admire we the love of God towards us, which (if ever it was shewn in anything) is shewn in this; and therefore this is made the great act of love, his 'emptying himself,' and 'becoming nothing,' as it were, that he being equal with God, 'took upon him the form of a servant.'
Solomon made a wonder of it, that he whom 'the heavens of heavens cannot contain,' should vouchsafe to dwell in 'temples made with hands,' 1 Kings 8:27. But this is nothing to his being personally united to the human nature, and to dwell bodily and personally in it, and so to be made one with the house in which he dwells, and which he himself built, that is, he to be made a creature, who made all creatures. It is to be admired that God would ever have it said that a creature was God, and that God is become a creature; yet so it is said,
John 1:18, 'The Word was made flesh.' For him to be made a creature is more than for us to become nothing, or for an angel to become a worm. It is therefore made a mystery, a great mystery, that all stand aghast at, as well angels as men (and this ὁμολογουμένως, even with one consent), that 'God should be manifest in the flesh:' 1 Tim. 3:16,
'And, without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.'
And if he be made a creature, let him be made the best of creatures, an angel, there being such nobleness in them above what is in us.
Their perfections are the measure of ours, and our perfection is expressed but by being like to them. Our estate in heaven is to be ὡς ἄγγελοι, 'as the angels.' Likewise the chiefest wisdom in any man is but as an angel's (as it is said of David). They for their substance are spirits, and therefore in a nearer degree of assimilation unto God, they are the fitter matches for him who is a spirit. Again, if he will assume anything of ours, let it be our souls only, for our bodies are
'vile bodies,' Philip. 3:21. But such was his love to us, that he will take both, because he means to redeem both, and to make our bodies glorious like his own body. And how doth the apostle in this, Heb.
2:16, set forth his love in this, that ὀυ δήπου, 'at no hand he took upon him the nature of angels,' though he could have done it easily, and with more personal honour, but he would 'in no wise' entertain a thought of it. Such was his love to us, that he refused that match, his
heart being fixed on us. He lets 'principalities and powers' go, and 'hath respect to the lowness of his handmaid,' Luke 1:48, the mean estate of our nature. But yet, if he take our nature, let him take it at its best, whilst in a state of innocency; let him marry it in its prime, and (as the high priest was to do) when it is a virgin uncorrupted, unpolluted with sin or misery, or rather, let him take it such as it is now in heaven, all glorious. But he will, out of his love to us, take our nature on him when it is at the worst, and then make it glorious, and us like him. When we are traitors, and out of favour, he will marry flesh and blood out of our stock and kindred, so to bring us into favour again. Was it not unparalleled love in Jonathan then to love
David, when he was in disgrace with his father? Much more would it have been for him, out of his love to David, as then to have married one of his children. How exceeding much more then is the love of Christ towards us?
2. For all which, as we should admire his love, so withal we should consider our privilege by having our nature so advanced. What a pawn and pledge of love is it to us, to have one of these bodies of ours made more glorious than all the angels? To whom charge is given, when he 'comes into the world,' to 'worship and adore him,' Heb. 1:6.
Who is to have them, and all things else put under his feet, and is to be their Lord and judge, and they all but to be his guard. What a prerogative is it that our nature should be in him made higher in court than any queen can be in the court of any king; and thus it is, seeing he is one in person with God, not in conjugal relations only, and the rest of his brethren are advanced to be his queen, and the angels to be but his and her guard and servants. And as this is the privilege of our nature, so some of the ancients have thought, that the revealing of God's purpose in it unto the angels before their fall was the occasion of the same, and that their casting out of heaven was a punishment of their proud stomaching of the honour done unto our nature, that it should be advanced so far above them (as the apostle speaks, Eph. 1:21). And it should teach us not to dishonour and defile this nature (which God hath so honoured) with intemperancy, uncleanness, or any base or noisome lusts. It also may
encourage us to come with boldness to the court of heaven and throne of grace, for that our nature is chief in favour there. Heb. 4:14,
'Seeing we have so great an high priest passed into the heavens, let us hold fast our profession.' And seeing he was man, 'touched with our infirmities, let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may find grace and mercy in time of need.' When one of a kindred is advanced and made a favourite at court, how will every one of his alliance (though never so far off) challenge kindred of him, and seek favour by him, and hope to be advanced too? And Christ is 'not ashamed' of us, his poor kindred; but being allied to us by his nature, he deigns to call us brethren, and is grieved that we come no oftener to him, with petitions of favour to be put up by him. And he not only called us brethren, when himself was with us in a poor estate here below, and lived in our houses amongst us, but likewise when he was risen again, and thereby entered into possession of his kingdom.
Even then the first message that he sent, and the first words that he spake, were those in John 20:17, 'Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father,' &c. You see his preferment alters him not; after his resurrection he calls them brethren. We should therefore improve this our affinity and kindred with him; he took it on him for that very purpose. And,
3. In that he took upon himself such a human nature as should be every way fit for the business of mediation that he was to perform for us, let us endeavour to fit ourselves all that we can, for communion and fellowship with him. The reason why we live here absent from him so long, though contracted to him already, is, to be fitted for his bed in heaven, and for everlasting embraces. Even as Esther was a long while preparing for Ahasuerus his bed, so are we here in preparing for glory; as it is, Rom. 9:23, 'And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of his mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory.' The bride dresseth herself here in this life; Rev. 19:7, 'Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour unto him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready,' and prepares to meet her Lord, with whom she must live for ever. And look, as he took our nature, let us take his; labour