Section I. — Of The Eternal Purpose Of Grace.
SECTION I. — OF THE ETERNAL PURPOSE OF GRACE.
Ant. I beseech you, sir, let us hear more of these things; and first of all, show us how we are to conceive of God’s eternal purpose in sending Jesus Christ.
Evan. Why, here the learned frame a kind of conflict in God’s holy attributes. And from the language of holy Scripture, using a liberty which the Holy Ghost allows them, they speak of God in the way of men — as if he were reduced to some straits and difficulties by the cross-demands of his several attributes. For Truth and Justice stood up and said that man had sinned, and therefore man must die; and so they called for the condemnation of a sinful and therefore worthily accursed creature; otherwise Truth and Justice must be violated. For You said (they said to God), “In that day that you eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you shall die the death.” Mercy, on the other side, pleaded for favour, and appeals to the great court in heaven.
There it pleads, saying, “Wisdom, and power, and goodness, have all been manifest in the creation; and anger and justice have been magnified in man’s misery that he is now plunged into by his fall. But I, Mercy, have not yet been manifested.” O let favour and compassion be shown towards man, woefully seduced and overthrown by Satan!” “Oh,” these said to God, “It is a royal thing to relieve the distressed; and the greater anyone is, the more placable and gentle he ought to be.” But Justice replied, “If I am offended, I must be satisfied and have my right; and therefore I require that man, who has lost himself by his disobedience, should, as a remedy, set obedience against it, and so satisfy the judgment of God.” Therefore the wisdom of God became an umpire, and devised a way to reconcile them, concluding that before reconciliation could be made, two things must be effected: (1.) A satisfaction of God’s justice. (2.) A reparation of man’s nature. These two things must be effected by a middle and common person, who had both zeal towards God, so that he might be satisfied; and also compassion towards man, so he might be repaired. Such a person, having man’s guilt and punishment transferred to him, might satisfy the justice of God; and having a fulness of God’s Spirit and holiness in himself, he might sanctify and repair the nature of man. And this could be none other but Jesus Christ, one of the Three Persons of the blessed Trinity.
Therefore, by his Father’s ordination, his own voluntary offering, and the Holy Spirit’s sanctification, he was fitted for the business. In consequence, there was a special covenant or mutual agreement made between God and Christ, as expressed in Isa. 53.10: if Christ would make himself a sacrifice for sin, then he would “see his seed, he would prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord would prosper by him.” So too in Psalm 89.19, the mercies of this covenant between God and Christ are set forth under the type of God’s covenant with David: “You spoke in a vision to your holy One, and said, I have laid help upon One who is mighty:” or, as the Chaldee expounds it, “One mighty in the law.” It is as if God had said, concerning his elect, I know that these will break, and never be able to satisfy me; but you are a mighty and substantial person, able to pay me. Therefore I will look for my debt from you. As Pareus well observes, God said to Christ, as it were, “I require all of what they owe me from your hands.” Then Christ said, “Behold, I come to do your will! In the volume of the book it is written of me, ‘I delight to do your will, O my God! Indeed, your law is in my heart,’” Psalm 40.7-8. Thus Christ assented. And from everlasting he struck hands with God to take man’s nature on himself; and to take man’s name for himself; and to enter in his stead in obeying his Father; and to do all for man that God would require; and to yield in man’s flesh the price of the satisfaction of the just judgment of God; and in the same flesh, to suffer the punishment that man deserved. And so he undertook this under the penalty that man was to have undergone. Thus justice was satisfied, and also mercy by the Lord Jesus Christ. And so God took Christ’s single bond, for which Christ is not only called the “surety of the covenant for us,” Heb. 7.22, but the covenant itself, Isa. 49.8.
And God laid all upon him, so that he might be sure of its satisfaction, protesting that he would not deal with us, nor so much as expect any payment from us — such was his grace. And thus our Lord Jesus Christ entered into the same Covenant of Works that Adam did, to deliver believers from it. He was content to be under all that commanding, revenging authority, which that covenant had over them, to free them from its penalty. In that respect, Adam is said to be a type of Christ, as you have it in Rom. 5.14, “who was the type of him that was to come.” To this purpose, the titles which the apostle gives these two, Christ and Adam, are exceedingly observable: he calls Adam the “first man,” and Christ our Lord the “second man,” 1Cor. 15.47. He spoke of them as if there had never been any more men in the world besides these two — thereby making them head and root of all mankind, having as it were, the rest of the sons of men included in them. The first man is called the “earthy man;” the second man, Christ, is called the “Lord from heaven,” 1Cor. 15.47. The earthy man had all the sons of men born into the world included in him; and so, in conformity to them, he is called the “first man:” the second Man, Christ, is called the “Lord from heaven,” who had all the elect included in him, who are said to be the “first born,” and to have their “names written in heaven,” Heb. 12.23. Therefore they are appositely called “heavenly men;” so that these two men, in God’s account, stood for all the rest. And thus you see that the Lord, willing to show mercy to the fallen creature, and with that, to maintain the authority of his law, took such a course as might best manifest his clemency and severity. Christ entered into covenant and became surety for man; and so he became liable for man’s engagements: for he that answers as a surety must pay the same sum of money that the debtor owes.
Thus I have endeavoured to show you how we are to conceive of God’s eternal purpose in sending Jesus Christ to help and deliver fallen mankind.