Chapter VIII
The glory of the gospel farther manifested, forasmuch as Christ, the great
subject of it, is, in the work of God upon us, revealed in the soul.
But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother s womb, and
called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me, <&c. Gal. I. 15, 16.
My designed subject is, the application of Christ to us, or, the appear
ing of Christ in us. There is Christ in redemption, which work was
wholly transacted out of us, between him and his Father. And the work
thereof I have handled. But this is Christ in application, or as brought home to our hearts, which is as necessary for our salvation as that other
of redemption.
You hear a great deal of talk of Christ within us. But as that talk runs,
truly another Christ is meant thereby than that Christ, God-man, that Jesus who was crucified at Jerusalem. But, indeed, Christ within us is no other than that very same Jesus who was and is out of us ; and both one and
the same, even Christ dwelling in the heart by faith, and manifested in us and to us.
Brethren, there is the work of election, which is the Father s ; there is
the work of redemption
: and both these wholly are performed without us. God was in Christ reconciling the world ; that is the Father and Christ
giving himself for us a ransom. It was he that died and offered a sacrifice, and now is risen and ascended long afore we were, and it is he that now in
tercedes in heaven, and transacts all with his Father for us ; and thus indeed
considered, he is a Christ without us ; but the same Christ is in you when
you are turned to God (or rather, that turns you to God, Acts iii. 26), and
are called by his grace, as the apostle saith here, when it pleased God to
call me by his grace, and reveal his Son in me, then you have the same
Christ that is without you, revealed in you, and brought home to you ; you have the whole of him first and last within you, according to what measure God hath appointed you in Christ, as you had the whole of himself given as a price for you, Eph. v. 2. It is the same Christ without us, and the same Christ within us ; only what he is, or did for us without us, the same
is applied to us. And it is this Christ in application (which is the very word the schoolmen use, of this matter) I would make my subject. And
as concerning that, the doctrine with which I shall centre in is, that Christ
revealed in us comprehends the whole of that work of application, first and
last. Or thus, that the whole bulk and sum of our practical religion, as
you use to call it, is resolved into God s revealing Christ, and Christ s re
vealing himself within us, from first to last, throughout our whole lives. Which comprehensiveness Paul surely intends here ; for, in saying,
* when God revealed his Son in me, though his first calling was the first begin ning thereof, yet he withal took in what from thence he had gone on to do throughout the rest of his life, for the same end that at first ; for that
revelation at first was, that he might preach what was revealed unto the
Gentiles. God, as he had begun, went on still to reveal him more in me, that I, knowing more and more of him, might be enabled to reveal more of him to others to whom I was sent ; only then he began with me. This phrase,
< revealing Christ within me, hath made a great deal of do among interpreters, as well as amongst us of late days. It is a stranga
344 A DISCOURSE OF THE [CHAP. VIII.
thing that Hierome, so long ago, should unluckily stumble upon the verynotion of the Quakers, or that which in those days the Pelagians held,
namely, that what light of God was in nature, or light of moral good in the
conscience, was the grace of Christ, which is all one with what our Quakers foundation is. And he fell upon this in opening this text : When it pleased God to reveal Christ in me, saith he, doth imply and suppose that Christ was in him before his calling, and his calling was but a revealing, a disco
very of what was by nature in him : Revelatur quod prius fuit in eo ; and
plainly and boldly he saith, Perspicuum est, it is plain from hence, that by nature there is the knowledge of God, and that no man is born without
Christ. This is the language that this man stumbled then upon. And truly, this interpretation of Hierome s so scared many interpreters, as it diverted them from the true sense (though it be plain enough), though not to his sense, to say, that Christ was revealed in him, this
phrase they knew not what to make of it, taken in the plain expression
Therefore,
Some interpreted it thus : When it pleased God to reveal his Son by me. In me they turned to per me. Voluit per me ftlium cognitum facere, so Grotius took it. Brethren, there is an apparent contradiction to this
in the text ; for he makes the end of God s revealing him in him to be, that he might preach him to others, which denotes that to have been the
final cause of God s revealing him first in himself. Therefore there can be no other meaning than this, that God was pleased first to reveal his Son
in him, when he called him, that is, in the person of Paul himself; that he having the experimental knowledge of this Christ within himself, in his own heart, and his own soul, for his own salvation, he might be able to
reveal him to others the more effectually, suitable to that in 2 Cor. i. 4,
< Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we might be able to com
fort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves
are comforted of God. When it pleased God to reveal his Son in me ; to make him known sensibly unto me, and to apply him experimentally in and to my soul. He did this, that I might (having the knowledge of him
for myself as the truth is in Jesus) make him known to others. And the words afore, He called me by his grace, shew that he speaks of his first
conversion, which was the fruit of his election, when it pleased God, &c. And it was then that God began to reveal Christ savingly unto him, or any man, as the main intention of God s calling a man, and as the chief thing above all others revealed, or to be revealed at a man s conversion ; though God reveals sin (you will say), he convinceth the world of sin, and ofjudg ment, and holiness. Yea, but he revealeth Christ ordinarily above all, and in all. But of all saints that ever were or shall be, God pitched Paul s
heart upon Christ at first, though he saw his sin too, Rom. vii., and the
sin of unbelief especially, as he saith in Timothy. And the knowledge of
Christ was the eminent work of Paul s conversion, and gave him a com
plete knowledge of him at first, because of the eminent present service God had for him to do. For immediately (he says) he consulted not, but fell
to preach Christ instantly, whom he thus knew.
l revealed Christ to me, which he would carry into the revelation of the doctrine of Christ in the gospel, whereof he had
Calvin interprets it mihi,
said, ver. 11 and 12, The gospel which was preached of me is not after man ; for I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the
revelation of Jesus Christ. And he and the former have their criticisms and Hebraisms for this.
CHAP. VIII.J GLORY OF THE GOSPEL. 845
Beza* indeed admits of that reading; to reveal it to me, mihi (for so
Calvin had afore expounded it :), but says, that it signified some further and larger matter ; and that from the like Hebrew propriety, being all one
) ^, and so signifies the grace of God to have come down from heaven into his very soul in the revelation of Christ. And Cornelius a Lapide, f among the papists, says, some indeed read it he revealed it to me ; but the word is, he revealed it in me, that he might
with
signify that his spirit drank in this revelation of Christ into himself, within the very intimacy of his heart ; so that Christ should be in him, and speak in him, when he preached to others. And he hath his Hebraism
for this too.
The main sum and substance of Christianity then is, that Christ be
revealed in us, and not only to us ; that you come to have Christ by appli cation in and to your souls ; Christ brought down into your heart. Yea, and this is the design of election : When it pleased God, saith he,
* who
separated me from my mother s womb, and called me by his grace, to
reveal his Son in me. It was the design of God s good pleasure towards him from eternity, as the word imports.
But you will say, Why do you bring in Paul an instance to make this
generally the sum of our Christianity first and last ? You will say, This
instance shews it to have been Paul s condition in and after his conversion ; but what is this to us inferior Christians, to propound his example to us ?
Truly, because take but the substance of religion and of true conversion, and it is common to Paul and us. Indeed, Paul differed from us in some
particular privileges about this matter. He differed from us herein, [1.] In the manner of having this revealed ; for he had it by immediate revelation, as the 12th verse tells you,
* I neither received it of man, neither was I
taught it, i. e. by the ministry of men, but by the revelation of Jesus
Christ. Where of Christ notes not out Christ as the object of the reve
lation, but as the worker. Christ himself converted him, and Christ him
self revealed himself to him, and the Father likewise, as the text here hath it ; but as for us, we have it by man. Ours is by means of instruc
tion ; and yet that knowledge of faith which we have of Christ is called a revelation : Eph. i. 17, speaking of ordinary Christians, he prays that
they may have the spirit of revelation in the knowledge of him, that is, of Christ. Thus, as Adam was made a man, flesh and bone as we have, but he was made immediately by God ; take other men, they have the same members of body and faculties of soul like, and answerable unto what Adam had, but we have them immediately by generation from man :
so it was with Paul. Again, [2.] Paul and we differ in the measure ; Paul had it by wholesale, as Adam was made a perfect man the first moment, and Paul had the whole system of the revelation of Christ in himself to his soul. He knew whole Christ at first, more or less. He
might know more of him by degrees afterwards, but at that present he had a whole knowledge of him ; and the reason is apparent from the end of it, which was, that he might preach Christ immediately. He had that in three days which others grow unto in many years. He was so
fully instructed, and made the man of God so perfect, as in the 2d
* Mihi sed tamen illud videtur quoddam eliam amplius significare ; quod apparet ex Hebrseorum idiotismo : et videtur eo dicendi genere significari, Dei gratiam ccalitus in animum ipsum illabi, ut Grscca etiam Scholia notarunt.
t Dicit potius in me? qiuim mihi, ut significet spiritura suum intimo cordeimbi-
bisse, ut Christus in eo essct, et per eura loqueretur.
346 A DISCOURSE OF THE GLORY OF THE GOSPEL. [CHAP. VIII.
chapter of this epistle he says, that the other apostles, that were pillars, and had lived long with Christ, and had the Spirit come down upon them, to enlighten them in what Christ had taught them, added nothing to him.
All, then, that God works upon you savingly, from first to last, is a dis
covery of Christ, some way or other, in you. It is either the knowledge of his person, or it is a conformity to him, or it is dispositions suited to what you know of him ; workings upon us, and operations of God upon us suitable to what is in him ; and this I call the sum or substance of our
religion.
Even as to the first work upon a man when he is humbled for sin, my opinion thereof is, that in a man that shall be saved it is a different work from what is in wicked men, that have terrors of conscience, and shall not be saved ; and that accordingly there is in it a part of conformity to Christ
crucified ; and I shall give you scriptures for it. Gal. ii. 19, he speaks of
being dead to the law through the law, which is to be convinced of sin ; and it is effected by the power of Christ crucified, so as if you ask, How came Paul to be thus dead to the law ? he tells you, Kom. vii. 4, that it was by the body of Christ. The very work of humiliation is a conformity to Christ ; and it is a be
ginning of revealing Christ in us. And if a man will look back upon all hath been wrought in him, he shall see that it is all Christ.
But however, that which is the eminency of Christianity, the bulk and substance of it, that, to be sure, is, all of it, Christ in us. It was Paul s
eminency that Christ was the sum of all he had and did, to the end that he might know and preach Christ ; and it is the whole of Christ that God reveals sooner or later, more or less, in and to all Christians, whether they know it or no.
If any ask, Why, when he speaks of revealing Christ in us, he should rather say, revealing his Son in us ? my answer is, The word Son com
prehends the whole of Christ.
I shall give you but an observation or two more.
1. Happy is that soul that in conversion or calling was pitched first on
Christ, or soon upon his conversion. If you that are now converted had
lived in our younger days, you would have seen that we were held under John Baptist s water, of being humbled for sin, and the work of sanctifi-
cation. But now, happy it is with some whose lot it is that their conver
sion work begins with Christ. Next after their humiliation for sin, they are pitched upon Christ. The work upon Paul was in this manner, who had the advantage of us this way, for Christ himself appeared to him, and
yet he was humbled, and saw sin to be above measure sinful, Eom. vii., and therefore the work of humiliation is necessary unto faith in Christ.
2. Another observation is, that whoever of you will be preachers of the
word, get Christ revealed in you, that you may preach him unto others, out
of the experience of that revelation. John ate the book, and then wrote
it, as you have it in Eev. x. 10.
3. Blessed is he that from his first conversion was pitched upon reaching out the experiences he had to others. Some men have, as Paul had, their inward motion to be ministers upon their being called ; as Paul had it con
joined therewith. And as God separated Paul from the womb for both, so he hath separated such.
THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD THE FATHER,
AND HIS SON JESUS CHRIST.
THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD THE FATHER, AND HIS SON JESUS CHRIST.