2. His humanity was really and intrinsecally glorified. There was a
in Christ's prayer to himself, for every assured believer may pray the same, Lord, give me that glory which I had with thee before the world was, viz., in thy decree. But no such expression fell from the lips of Moses, David, Paul, or any of those most triumphant in the assurances of everlasting happiness. It must be some expression of glory peculiar to the Son of God, and therefore a manifestation of the glory of the deity in his humanity in another manner than before, since that person that was the Son of God was now also the Son of man. Now this was no addition of glory to his deity, but a new mode of manifesting that glory which the human nature had before the world was, which never was exerted in such a manner before. It was a real addition of glory to his humanity, but a new way, or manner of manifestation of his divinity.
2. His humanity was really and intrinsecally glorified. There was a glory conferred upon his humanity by the grace of union with the second person in the blessed trinity; this was at the first conception in the womb of the blessed virgin. A greater glory than this can no creature have, to be 'called the Son of God,' Luke 1:35. There was also a glory bestowed upon it by the communication of unmatchable perfections to his soul, a fulness of the Spirit, a spotless sanctification, and an infallible knowledge of God, and of those truths he was to reveal. But now his humanity did ascend up where his person was before, and our nature was carried up to sit with him in the same court, where he had been glorious before in his deity. 'He ascended far above the highest heavens,' Eph. 4:10, into that place where God represents himself in the greatest majesty to angels and glorified spirits. He descended to assume our nature, he ascended to glorify our nature. The humanity was taken into perpetual society and conjunction with the deity at the first assumption of it; but by his exaltation the eternal subsistence of it in the deity was confirmed; and by the translating it to heaven, assurance was given that it should never be laid aside, but be for ever preserved in that marriage knot with the divinity. It was so enlarged and spiritualised, as to be a convenient habitation for the fulness of his deity to reside in, and exert its proper operations: Col. 2:9, 'In him dwells all the fulness of
the Godhead bodily;' not dwelling as if imprisoned, but to break forth in all its glories and graces; not formerly dwelling in it, but now dwells. There is a way of the presence of the deity with the humanity above all those manners of the presence of God with angels and men; it dwells in it, and acts in it, as a soul in its own body it is clothed with, so that the humanity is the humanity of the Son of God, and heightened to be the sacred vessel of the fulness of the Godhead.
That nature wherein the person of the Son of God was 'made lower than the angels, was crowned with glory and honour,' Heb. 2:7. That nature wherein he was raised, was set 'at God's right hand in heavenly places,' Eph. 1:20, and in that nature, as well as in the divine, the person of the Son of God had a sovereign authority granted to him. Thus the humanity was glorified above all the reach of any human understanding. The glory of the saints is not to be fathomed by the conceptions of men, much less the glory of Christ, the exemplar of all the glory they are to have.
The humanity of Christ, consisting of two principal parts, body and soul; both were glorified.
(1.) His body. As his sufferings were in order to his glory, so the part wherein he suffered was to enjoy a glory. 'Enter into his glory,' i.e. a glory due to him for his sufferings, therefore due to every part wherein he suffered. This being an essential part of the human nature, is not laid aside; the knot between this and his deity remains for ever indissoluble; it remains still as to its substance, though enriched with new qualities, being stripped of the mutability and mortality to which it was subject on earth. As in his descent the deity was emptied of the manifestation of its glory, so in his exaltation, his body of its natural infirmities. The image of the first Adam, except the substance, was razed out, and was actually framed in the second
Adam; there was not a destruction of the body, but a transfiguration of it, and his body is no more changed in regard of the substance by its translation into heaven, than it was in his transfiguration on the mount; nor changed in its lineaments, but in its qualities: Mat. 17:2,
'His face did shine as the sun;' the substance remained, but changed
into a glorious appearance; he had the same lineaments in Tabor as he had at the foot of the mount. Peter could not else have distinguished him from Moses and Elias. Had he not been stripped of his infirmities, he had still, even in heaven, been in some sort lower than the angels, which he was designed to be only for a time,
Heb. 2:7, βραχύ τι, 'a little while,' a short space, in the time of his humiliation.
[1.] His body is therefore of a spiritual nature, in opposition to infirm flesh. Flesh in Scripture is sometimes taken so: Ps. 78:39, 'He remembered that they were but flesh,' i.e. infirm and perishing flesh.
The natural bodies of the saints shall, at the resurrection, be changed into spiritual, 1 Cor. 15:44; much more is the body of Christ in glory, since it is the pattern according to which the body of the saints shall be copied and fashioned, Philip. 3:21. His state in the world is called
'the day of his flesh,' Heb. 5:7; his state above is a spiritual state, as being free from the infirmities and clogs of the flesh. Flesh he hath still, but more suited to that heaven which was his original; an heavenly, no longer an earthly, image, 1 Cor. 15:48, 49; like turf or wood, that loses its drossy and foggy qualities, when heightened into a pure flame, or minerals heightened into spirits. His body was spiritual after his resurrection, it could pass in a short moment from one place to another, Luke 24:31. As his body rose, so it ascended, and remains a spiritual body, or as one calls it, organized light.
[2.] It is therefore bright and glorious. If the righteous are to 'shine as the sun in the kingdom of their Father,' Mat. 13:43, the head of the righteous shines with a splendour above that of the sun, for he hath a glory upon his body, not only from the glory of his soul (as the saints shall have), but from the glory of his divinity in conjunction with it.
The glory of his divinity redounds upon his humanity, like a beam of the sun, that conveys a dazzling brightness to a piece of crystal. There was an interruption of this glory while he was in the world, though the human nature then was united with the divine. But this interruption was necessary for those acts which he was to perform in our stead, for the satisfaction of God and the discharge of his office.
Had the glory of the divinity broke out upon his body, he had not been capable of suffering. What mortal could have stood before him, much less laid hands on him? What mortal durst have accounted him a blasphemer, an impostor, and have exercised any violence against him, had his divinity so fashioned his humanity? But now it is, as it was in his transfiguration, Mat. 17:2; the glory he had then in transitu wrought an alteration not only in his body, but in his garments, which could not be of the most splendid, as not suiting his present state of humiliation, yet they 'became shining, exceeding white as snow, so as no fuller upon earth can white them,' Mark 9:3; much more must that firm and perpetual glory in heaven have the same influence upon his refined body, that hath cast off those corruptible qualities which hung upon it on earth, and doth more excel in glory that body he had on earth, than the glory of the sun surpasseth that of a glow-worm. It is such a glory as would dazzle mortals to behold it; for if his glory upon mount Tabor cast Peter into an ecstasy, what effect would his glory upon his throne work upon a moral nature? Whence it follows that there must be a mighty change of the bodies of the glorified saints, to capacitate them for the beholding this glory of Christ, the intent views whereof are part of their happiness, John 17:24.
[3.] His body is immortal. His body now lives, and shall live for evermore: Rev. 1:18, 'lam he that lives, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen;' which is confirmed by him with a solemn Amen. A corruptible body is not fit to be admitted to sit down upon the throne of the Father in heaven. The promise that secured to him, in the state of his humiliation, a speedy resurrection from the grave, and an impossibility of seeing corruption, Ps. 16:10, is as valid as ever. That body that was not dissolved to dust by the power of the grave, cannot sink into nothing in the glories of heaven. The union of the Godhead to it preserved it here, and the perpetual confirmation of that union preserves it for ever above. His body lives an indissoluble life, death shall never more lay hands on it; he hath no more sufferings to endure, or satisfactions to make to the demands of the law. Men and devils cannot touch him in his person, though
they do in his mystical body. He is above the reach of all temptations, all wrath from his Father, all violences from men, and therefore his glorious body is not in such a state as to be ground between the teeth of communicants, or eaten by rats and mice, or in any part of it dropped upon the ground, and buried again in the dust or mire, as the bread in the supper may. If that were really the body of Christ, the body of Christ would be then so treated, as consisted not with the glory it is now possessed of.
(2.) As his body, so his soul, the principal part of the humanity, was glorified. That suffered in agonies and sorrows: 'His soul was sorrowful, even to the death,' Mat. 26:38. That also enters into glory; and indeed the body cannot be rightly glorified without the glory of the soul; for the glory of the body is but the reflection of the glory of the soul in any creature.
[1.] He hath an unspeakable joy in his soul. Ps. 16:11, 'Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore.' It is Christ's triumphing in the consideration of his exaltation, and taking pleasure in the fruits of his sufferings; 'thou wilt shew me the paths of life.' God hath now opened the way to paradise, which was stopped up by a flaming sword, and made the path plain by admitting into heaven the head of the believing world. This is a part of the joy of the soul of Christ; he hath now a fulness of joy, a satisfying delight instead of an overwhelming sorrow; a 'fulness of joy,' not only some sparks and drops, as he had now and then in his debased condition; and that in the presence of his Father. His soul is fed and nourished with a perpetual vision of God, in whose face he beholds no more frowns, no more designs of treating him as a servant, but such smiles that shall give a perpetual succession of joy to him, and fill his soul with fresh and pure flames. Pleasures they are, pleasantness in comparison whereof the greatest joys in this life are anguish and horrors. His soul hath joys without mixture, pleasures without number, a fulness without want, a constancy without interruption, and a perpetuity without end. And having a fulness of joy, he hath a
fulness of knowledge in his soul; he increased in wisdom in his soul, as he did in stature, and that as really in the one as he did in the other, Luke 2:40; his humanity had not the knowledge of all things in his humiliation, his soul had one thing revealed to it after another.
But in his exaltation his soul is endowed with all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. He knows now the time of judgment, since he is constituted the Judge of the world, whereof his resurrection was an assurance to men, and no less an assurance to himself, Acts
17:31, since by his resurrection, the first step of his exaltation, God judged him a righteous person, and acknowledged him his Son with power, that had redeemed a world, whereby there was an evidence also that by him he would judge the world. Among other infirmities of his nature, his soul hath put off that of ignorance. Nothing that is a treasure of knowledge is concealed from it; he hath the knowledge of God's decrees concerning his people: Rev. 1:1, God gave the revelation of all to him; no other person opens the book, or is acquainted with the counsel of it, Rev. 5:5–7. This knowledge he hath in his humanity, as he is the lion of the tribe of Judah, and the root of David. This revelation is to him as Mediator, in his human nature, distinct from that knowledge he had as God. As his mediatory glory is distinct from that essential glory he had as God, so there is a revealed knowledge to him, distinct from that knowledge he had as God. There was a necessity that Christ, in his human nature, should understand the secrets of God, since he was in that nature to be the executor of the counsels of God; and this is another part of the glory of his soul.
(3.) His person was glorified. His divine nature being glorified in a manifestation, and a new manner of manifestation, and his human nature being glorified by an accession of new qualities to it, his person then was glorified. As his person was the prime subject of humiliation in taking upon him the form a servant, so it was the prime subject of exaltation and glory. His person was the subjectum quod, and his human nature the subjectum quo. In regard of his person he is glorified, as in regard of his person he was humbled; the same person 'that was rich became poor,' 2 Cor. 8:9. He that was rich
and he that was poor was one and the same person. Howsoever riches and poverty were distinct conditions, and divinity and humanity were distinct natures, yet they were the conditions and they were the natures of one and the same person, who is both rich and poor in regard of different states, as well as immortal and mortal, existing from eternity and born in time in regard of different natures, eternal as God and born as man, above all suffering and violence as God, exposed to suffering and violence as man. The person that was crucified was the Lord of glory, 1 Cor. 2:8; the person that was crucified and suffered entered into glory; it was the person of Christ therefore wherein this glorious exaltation did terminate. As the deity was not emptied, nor could be, but obscured in the assuming our flesh and investing himself in the form of a servant for the performance of those mediatory acts in his humiliation which were necessary for our redemption, so the deity could not be exalted but by displaying itself, and discharging that disguise of infirmities wherewith it was clouded. Nor could the exaltation of his human nature, simply considered, be for the happiness and comfort of his people, for as man barely considered he could not be the king of angels and governor of the church; he could not, as man barely considered, direct the angels in their needful messages, or relieve the church in her great distresses; for the humanity was neither omniscient nor omnipotent, nor could be. It is impossible humanity can become a deity, and a creature inherit the incommunicable perfections of the Creator; but as the deity is in conjunction with the humanity, and doth make use of the humanity, and act in and by it, he is capable of performing those things which were necessary, as Lord of the world and head of the church. The actions Christ doth perform, as sitting at the right hand of God, are the acts of him as man; but the principle of those acts is his divine nature as he is God. The glorious exaltation of Christ is therefore the exaltation of his person, for those ends which were necessary for the good of the believing world.
(4.) This glory which Christ entered into was a mediatory glory. The glory Christ was advanced to was not the essential glory of God, for
this he always possessed; this was communicated to him in the communication of the essence, and inseparable from him. As being
God, he had all the prerogatives of God; but it was a mediatory glory conferred upon his person, as the first-born of every creature; such a glory as the humanity, so dignified by the divine nature's assumption of it, was capable of. The humanity being a creature, was not capable of a divine and uncreated glory. The glory Christ hath as God is the same with the glory of the Father, but the glory Christ hath as mediator is peculiar to him as a person consisting of a divine and a human nature; therefore it is in the text called his glory, in a way of peculiarity belonging to him as a sufferer; for the divine nature was not capable of an addition of glory, nor the human nature capable of the infinite perfections of the divine. In regard of his essential glory, he was the Son begotten; in regard of his mediatory glory, he was the heir appointed, Heb. 1:2. He is appointed heir in order after his sufferings, as he was appointed mediator in order to his sufferings,
Heb. 3:2. He was mediator by a voluntary designation, so he was heir by a voluntary donation. His glory was given to him upon condition of suffering, and conferred upon him after his suffering; but he was from eternity the Lord of glory, and Son of God by a natural generation. The one belonged to him by birth, the mediatory by office; the one is natural to his person, the other is the reward of his sufferings: Philip. 2:8, 9, 'Wherefore God hath exalted him,' viz., because of his obedience to death. In the essential glory, he is one with the Father; in his mediatory glory, he is lower than the Father, as being his deputy and substitute. His essential glory is absolute, his mediatory glory is delegated, judgment is committed to him, John
5:22. The essential glory is altogether free, and hath no obligation upon it; the mediatory glory hath a charge annexed to it (for he is
'ascended far above the heavens, that he may fill all things,' Ephes.
4:10), an office of priesthood to intercede, and a royal office to gather and govern those that are given to him by his Father. His essential glory he would have enjoyed, if he had never undertaken to be our ransom; yet without his sufferings for us, he had never had the glorious title of the Redeemer of the world. As God had been essentially glorious in himself, if he had never created a world; but he
had not then been so manifest under the title of Creator. This glory was, nevertheless, properly neither divine nor human; not divine, because, considered as man [he] was a creature, and a divine glory is incommunicable to any creature; considered as God, there could be no addition of glory to him.* This is said to be given him as that which he had not before; not a human glory, for as man only he was below it, and was not a subject capable of it. A mere man was unable to govern and judge the world. To be head of the church, and judge of the universe, are titles that belong to God, and none else; but it was a mediatory glory proper to the person of Christ, and both natures as joined by the grace of union for the work of mediation. Now though
Christ, in regard of his divine nature, was 'equal with his Father,'
Philip. 2:6, yet in the state of mediator and surety for man, his Father was 'greater than he,' John 14:28; and in this state he was capable of a gift and glory from the Father, as from one that was superior to him in that condition; as it hath been recorded in history, that a king equal, nay, superior, to another prince, hath put himself under the ensigns of that prince inferior to him, and received his pay; as he puts himself in such a military state, he is inferior to that prince he serves as his general. And what military honour may be conferred upon him for his valour and service, is an honour distinct from that royal dignity he had before as a sovereign in his own territories. So is this name given to Christ 'above every name,' Philip. 2:9, i.e. a glory surpassing that of all creatures, the potentates of the earth, or seraphims of heaven, which was a distinct glory from that which he had, as one with the Father, before his incarnation and passion, and had possessed if he had never suffered. But this glory mentioned by the apostle was given him upon his sufferings. It was not therefore a name in regard of his eternal generation, as some interpret it;* for the particle wherefore, in the beginning of ver. 9, puts a par to any such interpretation, it referring this glory as a consequent upon his humiliation to the death of the cross. It was therefore a mediatory glory, whereby the authority of God was conferred upon him, not absolutely and formally, as though he were then made God, but as to the exercise of it as mediator in that human nature which he had so
obediently subjected to the cross for the glory of the Father and the good of the creature.
(5.) This mediatory glory consisted in a power over all creatures; for it was such a 'name as was above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, and that every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father,' Philip. 2:10, 11.
He had the same power committed to him which the Father hath; his throne is the highest, being the same with that whereon the Father sat, Rev. 3:21, a throne of government and dominion. His commission is extensive, a power as large as the confines of heaven and earth: Mat. 28:18, 'All power is given me both in heaven and earth. A power over hell is also put into the patent: Rev. 1:18, 'And have the keys of hell and death.' His right to this was conditionally conferred upon him at the first striking of the agreement between the Father and himself, Isa. 53:10–12. He promised upon his oblation for sin, to 'divide him a portion with the great,' and he should 'divide the spoil with the strong.' This was acknowledged due to him upon his resurrection, which, being an owning of the validity of his performance, was an acknowledgment of the justice of his claim; and to this that in Mat. 28:18, refers, 'All power is given to me.' But the solemn investiture was not given him till his ascension. God put the sceptre in his hands when he used that form of words, Ps. 110:1, 'Sit thou at my right hand till I make thy enemies thy footstool;' for in the apostle's sense, to sit at the right hand of God and to reign, are one and the same; for what is 'sitting at the right hand of God till his enemies be made his footstool,' is 'reigning till all enemies be put under his feet,' 1 Cor. 15:25. At his resurrection he was stripped of his servile garb, at his ascension he put on his royal robes, at his session on the right hand of God he was crowned, and began the exercise of his royal dignity.
[1.] He hath all power in heaven. Power in the treasures of heaven, power over the inhabitants of heaven.
(1.) Power in the treasures of heaven, of sending the Comforter: John 15:26, 'The Comforter whom I will send,' which was sent in his name,
John 14:26. His power was first in heaven, then in earth; his power on earth could not have been manifested without a power first in heaven; by his power in heaven he gathered his people on earth.
When God had given us the greatest gift, his Son, for the honour of his mercy, he gives the greatest gift next to him, viz., that of the Spirit, for the honour of his Son's mediation. As Christ, in the evangelic economy, acted for the honour of the Father, so doth the Spirit in the same economy for the honour of Christ: John 16:14, 'He shall glorify me.' He is therefore called the Spirit of Christ. He is also said to have 'the seven spirits of God,' Rev. 3:1. Seven is a scriptural number of perfection; he hath the full power of the gifts and graces of the Spirit to bestow upon the church, and fill his mystical body with.
By this it was evident that as a mediator he had a mighty power with God, since the first fruits of his exaltation was the effusion of a comforter for us, a second advocate on earth. This being the fruit of his mediation, and given to him as mediator, was a full confirmation not only of the virtue of his death, but the powerful continuance of it still in heaven, not only that it was accepted for us, but that the virtues and fruits of it should be perpetually distributed to us. This power of the Spirit was given to Christ immediately upon his ascension, as the purchase of his sufferings, and the reward of his conquests: Ps. 68:18, 'Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive, thou hast received gifts for men.' By his solemn investiture, he was settled in a power over the treasures of God, and gave out that in abundance which before was communicated in some few drops; the heavens are opened, and a golden shower comes down upon the world. In a sensible and apparent manner, he received this
Spirit before for himself, for he had it without measure, he received it before, when he entered upon his office, to fit him for his mediation, he now receives this power as mediator upon his ascension, and as a steward for his people, to distribute this rich revenue of God for the greatening of his church; upon his ascension he received it to give out to those he had left behind him in the world, Ps. 68:18. 'Received
gifts for men,' Eph. 4:8; it was then the donative of the Father to Christ, that it might be Christ's donative to us.
By the way, we may take notice of another argument for the necessity of the exaltation of Christ in heaven, since the Spirit being an heavenly gift, it was not fit he should be sent by a person that was not possessed of heaven; and it being the purchase of the mediator, and to be sent in his name, it was convenient the mediator should be in heaven, and have a more glorious residence than in the earth, before the mission of so great a gift.
(2.) Power over the inhabitants of heaven. In his incarnation, in the days of his flesh, he was lower than the angels; in his ascension, he is made higher by the shoulders than the loftiest of them, and this in regard of his office as mediator, for as God he had an essential superiority above them before; the superiority over them as he was
God he had by nature, the superiority over them after his humiliation he had upon the execution of his mediatory office. The angels that had their residence in heaven were to bow to him, yield obedience to him, as he was God-man, for so he was exalted as Jesus, as one that had 'suffered death,' Philip. 2:9. They were to give him an adoration which pertained to God, and, according to this divine order, they pay him actual adorations before his throne as 'the Lamb of God,' Rev.
5:11–13, and they are put in subjection to him as their head, not only for a time but for ever, in this world and that which is to come, Eph.
1:21, to order, direct, and commission them for the ends of his mediation, according to that compassionate sense he hath in his glory, of the infirmities and distresses of his people. He is Lord of all of them to this purpose; one hath not the privilege to stand before God, and another subject to run upon his errands in the world, but all are subjected to the sceptre of Christ, to be used by him at his pleasure in his service. And in this respect he received all power, first in heaven, then in earth; 'things in heaven' are first gathered, after that 'things on earth,' Eph. 1:10. The holy angels were all subjected to him upon his exaltation by one entire donation, the promise of making him their head was fully accomplished; whereas there is to
be a revolution of time to the end of the world, before things in earth shall be gathered to him, before all his elect shall submit to his sceptre, and his enemies be debased to his footstool. But upon his advancement, as there was an actual donation of them by his Father, so there was an entire submission of them in one body to him. The whole corporation of those blessed spirits waited upon him in his entrance into heaven to his coronation, according to the will of their
God, and his God, who had given them a precept to 'worship him,'
Ps. 68:17, 18, and that in a military posture as their general, noted by the word chariots, which were used chiefly in war and warlike triumphs.
[2.] Power in earth over all creatures: 'There is nothing left that is not put under him,' Heb. 2:8. All things are given him by God, to be in subjection either voluntary or constrained. He is Lord of all the creatures as God-man, because all the creatures were made for man; and Christ being the Lord of all mankind, is also the Lord of all the creatures that were made for the use and benefit of man.* He is therefore 'the first-born of every creature,' Col. 1:15; the right of primogeniture is conferred upon him, and so he became Lord of all; as Adam, in regard of his dominion over all earthly creatures, might be said to be the first-born of them, though himself is created after them. His power upon earth consisteth in this, that all the worship of God is to be done in his name; our supplications for the supply of our wants, our acknowledgments for the receipt of his blessings, must be presented 'in his name,' John 16:26, Eph. 5:20. He is made a priest to offer our sacrifices and incense of prayers; he is the channel through which God conveys all the marks of his kindness to us; he hath power as a prince 'to give repentance' as the means, and 'remission of sin' as the privilege of those that are given to him, Acts
5:31. He hath a name above every name in the earth; no person was ever so famous, none ever was adored by so many worshippers, none worshipped with so much fervency, none ever had so many lives sacrificed for his glory, and acknowledgment of his mediation and person. His glory hath extended one time or other over the whole world. It is a power that hath given check to the power of kings, and