guishable a threefold love of God toward men, intimated SERM. in Scripture. 1. A general love to mankind, antecedent XXVII. to the sending our Lord, and his performances, being the ground of God's defigning them; which may be called a love of pity, or mercy toward poor man lying under condemnation and diftrefs; this is that φιλανθρωπία TOυ σwτñρos jμãν Oɛoũ, philanthropy of God our Saviour, Tit. iii. 4. which appeared in faving us, (that is, in granting us the capacity and means of falvation,) not by works of righteoufnefs, which we had done, but by his mercy; the love which he commended, in that while we were finners Chrift Rom. v. 8. died for us. 2. A love, immediately confequent upon our Lord's performances and fufferings, and procured by them; whereby God is fo far pleased with men, and reconciled to the world, that he defireth all men's falvation, 1 Tim. ii. 4. and offereth to them terms and means thereof; in regard Tit. ii. 11. to which our Lord is faid to be the Saviour of the world, and Redeemer of all men; of which love St. Paul speaketh, when he saith, that being enemies we were reconciled 1 Tim. ii. 6. to God by the death of his Son; and that God was in Chrift reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing 2 Cor. v. 19. their fins; and that God having made peace by the blood Col. i. 20. of his cross, did reconcile by him all things unto himself, as 1. 33. whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven; the Rom. xi.32. which may be called a love of reconciliation and favour ; 1 Tim. ii. 4. or the grace of God, which came by Jefus Chrift. iv. 10. Rom. v. 10. John i. 17. Luke ii. 14. 3. A peculiar love of friendship and complacence, which God beareth toward all thofe who do fincerely turn and steadfastly adhere to him, repenting of their fins and embracing the Gofpel, and perfifting in obedience to his laws; fuch God is every where represented to affect with tendereft love, as his faithful fervants, his good friends, and dear children; being especially the Saviour of 1 Tim. iv. them this diftinction is obfervable for our better understanding the passages of fcripture concerning this matter; in which God is fometime represented as bearing a general love to all men, fometime as more especially loving the faithful and good men. : The like principles and impulfive caufes are faid to 10. Eph. v. 2, 25. Rev. i. 5. SERM. move our Lord to undertake and undergo death for us; XXVII. it was goodness and love toward us that inclined him thereto Chrift, faith St. Paul, loved us, and delivered up himself for us, an offering and facrifice to God: He loved 1 John iii. the Church, and delivered up himself for it. He loved (John xv. us, and washed us from our fins in his blood: Hereby we perceive the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: I live, faith St. Paul again, by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. 16. 13.) Gal. ii. 20. Ifa. liii. 5, 6. 2 Cor. v. 15. 8, 10. 1 Pet. iii. 18. Such were the principles difpofing, and caufes in a fort moving; to which we may add our fins, as the merito1 Cor. xv.3. rious causes of our Saviour's death; He died for our fins ; Heb. x. 12. He was wounded for our tranfgreffions, he was bruised for our iniquities. He died for us, not only as for men, not Rom. v. 6, only as for wretched men, but as for unjust and finful men; as for enemies, and strangers to God; fuch as had grievously displeased God, had incurred heinous guilt, had deserved, and were become obnoxious to severest punishment; so standing in need of reconcilement, propitiation, and redemption. Had we been innocent and guiltlefs, there had wanted fufficient cause, or just reason for his death; God would not have been angry, justice could have had no pretence, or hold; we should not have been liable to fuffer ourfelves, nor could he have fuffered for Rom.vi. 23. us. Death is the debt, or wages due to fin; which he therefore paid, because we owed it, and could not difIfa. liii. 6, charge it: All we, as it is faid in the Prophet, have gone afiray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord (therefore) hath laid on him the iniquity of us all: our fins were not only indirect or remote occafions of his death, but did procure it in way of defert: even as they would have been meritorious caufes of our death, had he not undertaken for us, fo were they the like causes of his death, who died for us, and in our ftead; who was 1 Tim. ii. 6. made fin (that is, a finner, or a facrifice) for us; who gave himfelf ἀντίλυτρον, α runfom inftead of us all; paying his 1 Cor. vi. blood a price for us, and redeeming us thereby from all 20. vii. 23. the penalties and inconveniencies we were liable to; buying Gal. iii. 13. us from the curfe, by becoming a curfe for us; who had 4, 11. 2 Cor. v. 21. Matt. xx. 28. Heb. ix. 12. 1 Pet. i. 18. Rom. iii.24. 2 Pet. ii. 1. Eph. i. 7. Col. i. 14. XXVII. upon him the chastisement of our peace; and did offer up SERM. his foul an offering and facrifice for our fins; thereby expiating them, propitiating God's wrath, and reconciling Ifa. liii. 5, God unto us, purging us from guilt, and procuring entire 10. remiffion for our fins; the which confiderations do fuffi- 1 John ii. 2. ciently argue our fins, in way of defert, to have been the iv. 10. causes of his death. Heb. x. 12. Rom.iii. 25. Heb. ii. 17. Rom. v. 10, 11. 19. Now for the ends which our Lord's death aimeth at, and the effects which it produceth, (these we join, because 2 Cor. v. in reality they are the fame,) they, in Scripture reckoning Eph. ii. 16. and expreffion, are various and many: the most generali:7; are these, comprehending divers others fubordinate to 28, 26. them. Heb. ix. 14, John iii. 36. 1 John i. 7. Rom. iii. 5. 27. 1. The illuftration of God's glory, by demonftrating 28. and displaying therein his moft excellent attributes and Col. i. 14. perfections; so doth St. Paul teach us; Whom God, faith Rev. i. 5. he, hath fet forth a propitiation by faith in his blood, sis Col. žvdağıv tñs dixaiooúvns aŭtoũ, for a demonftration of his right- Eph. ii. 7. eousness; that is, as I take it, of his goodness, his justice, his fidelity, his conftancy, of all thofe commendable (John xxi, 20.) perfections, which are expreffed in dealing with others; and our Lord, his paffion being instantly to follow, made this reflection; Now is the Son of man glorified, and God John xiii. is glorified in him; and, I have glorified thee upon earth; 131. xvii. 4 have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. God did therein fhew himself most highly good and gracious, in fo providing for the welfare of those who deferved nothing of him, who deferved ill of him, who had offended and injured him very heinously: he manifefted himself most strictly just, in not fuffering iniquity to go unpunished, but rather than fo, expofing his own dear Son to punishment, and in him choofing himself to fuffer; he declared his wisdom in contriving fo admirable an expedient, whereby both his goodness might be exercised, and his justice not infringed; he fhewed his veracity, fidelity, and conftancy, in executing by his providence what he before had defigned and promised, although fo grievous and bitter to the Son of his love: he therein alfo laid a ground of declaring his almighty power, in raifing SERM. him from the dead, as likewife of his goodness and justice XXVII. in exalting him: thus by our Saviour's death was the divine glory much illuftrated, and our good confequently promoted; for that we therein contemplating him fo amiable for goodness, so terrible for juftice, fo venerable for all excellency, may be induced thence to love him, to dread him, to worship and reverence him, as it becometh us, and as it is neceffary for us in order to our happiness. 2. The dignifying and exaltation of our Lord himself; by acquiring unto him in a manner a new right unto, and inftating him in an univerfal dominion, in a transcendent glory, in perfect joy accruing to him by remuneration for fo excellent an inftance of fubmiffion and obedience to God's will. This is that which our Lord John xiii. forefaw and foretold; If God was glorified in him, then 32. xvii. 5. will God glorify him in himself, and fhall fraightway Rom.xiv. 9. glorify him: and, To this end, faith St. Paul, Chrift died, that he might be the Lord of the dead and living: and, Heb. ii. 9. For the fuffering of death he was crowned with glory and Phil.ii. 8,9. honour, faith the Apostle to the Hebrews: and, He was Heb. ii. 10. obedient to the death, therefore God exalted him and, The Prince of our falvation was perfected by fuffering: and, Heb. xii. 2. For the joy that was fet before him he endured the cross: Ifa. liii. 11. and, He, faid the Prophet of him, fhall fee the travail of Rev. v. 12, his foul, and be fatisfied: and, Worthy, fay the heavenly hoft in the Apocalypfe, is the Lamb that is flain, (worthy is he, for that he was flain, and did redeem us to God by (Tit. ii. 14.) his blood,) to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and ftrength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. 9. 3. The falvation of mankind; the which he was defigned to procure by his death, and in many respects he did promote it thereby. He did it by appeafing that wrath of God which he naturally beareth toward iniquity, and reconciling God to men, who by fin were alienated from him; by procuring a favourable disposition and intentions of grace toward us. Rom. v. 8, While we were finners, faith St. Paul, Chrift died for us, (and finners, or wicked men, God cannot like or endure: 10. 16. Ifa. iii. 8. Thou art not, faith the Pfalmift, a God that haft pleasure SERM. in wickedness, neither shall evil dwell with thee; the foolish XXVII. fhall not fiand in thy fight; thou hateft all workers of ini- Pfal. v. 4. quity: and, The wicked, and him that loveth violence, his xi.5.xxxiv. foul hateth: yet for us, being fuch, Chrift died, removing Hab. i. 3. thereby that juft hatred and difpleasure; as St. Paul prefently after expreffeth and expoundeth it; When, faith he, we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son :) and otherwhere, God, faith he, was in Christ re- 2 Cor. v. 19. conciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trefpaffes unto them; the non-imputation of our fins is expreffed as a fingular effect, an inftance, an argument of his being in mind reconciled and favourably disposed toward us and again; He died to reconcile both (Jews and Eph. ii. 16. Gentiles) unto God in one body by the cross, having flain 21, &c. the enmity thereby; that is, God being thereby reconciled to all people, they became thence united together in the common relation of friends and fellow-fervants to God; becoming, as it there follows, fellow-citizens with Ephef. ii. the faints, and of the household of God, (or allied unto him by fpiritual relations.) Col. i. 20, 19. Οἰκεῖοι τοῦ Again, It furthered our falvation, by purchafing the remiffion of our fins, and justification of our perfons; our freedom from condemnation and punishment, our appearance as upright, and acceptable in God's fight; upon the conditions of faith and repentance propounded in the Gospel ; in regard to which effects he is faid thereby to redeem us from our fins, to bear them, to take them away, to expiate them, to cleanse, to purge, to fanctify us from them: Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Rom. viii. God's elect? Who fhall condemn them? It is Chrift that died; that is, Chrift's death hath freed them from all liableness to guilt and condemnation. Chrift hath redeem- Gal. iii. 13. ed us from the curfe of the Law, being made a curfe for. us; that is, he by undergoing an accurfed kind of death (1 Pet. ii. hath purchased an indemnity and impunity for the trans- 24.) greffors of God's Law: and, Being juftified by his blood, Rom. v. 8, we fhall be faved by him from wrath; that is, from the effects of God's juft difpleasure, condemnation, and pu 34. |