SERM. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be

In speaking to which words, therefore, as I shall not trouble you with any impertinent notions or critical observations upon them, so I must be sure likewise to hide nothing from you, but to give you the full meaning and purport of them. For which end there are two things necessary to be explained in them; whereof the first is, Who this Lord Jesus Christ is, Whom we ought to believe in; and the other, what it is to believe in Him: for he that knows these two things, knows all that the Apostle intended in these words, and by consequence whatsoever is necessary for his everlasting Salvation.

First, therefore we must consider Who this Lord Jesus Christ is. But this you may think to be a very unnecessary and superfluous question; as taking it for granted, that you all know Christ well enough already. But I fear you may be mistaken; for it is very rare to find any one that hath right notions and conceptions of Christ. I do not deny but you may all know there was such a Person once upon earth that was called Jesus Christ, that He did many miracles, that He was put to death, and rose again the third day, and then went up to Heaven, and the like. But all this you may know, and yet know nothing of Christ, as you ought to know it. The Corinthians had heard of Christ as well as you, yea, and were professors of His religion, as you all are; and yet for all that, the great and only thing which 1 Cor. 2. 2. St. Paul strove to make known unto them, was, "Christ

and Him crucified." And, as St. Paul there said to them, so may I say to you, that although it be too much grown out of fashion with many to preach Christ and Him crucified, yet this is the great thing which I determine, and by the blessing of God shall endeavour to make known unto you; as knowing it is impossible for you to come to Heaven without believing in Christ, and as impossible to believe in Him unless you know Him.

Now, there are three things necessary to be known concerning Christ, His Person, His Offices, and His Merits; concerning His Person, you must know that He was God

and man, united together in one and the self-same

Person.

1st. I say, He was God, really and truly God, of the selfsame nature, substance, wisdom, power, and glory with the Father not a creature, as the Socinians would make Him; not only a made God, and constituted to be so by the Father, as the Arians asserted; nor only 'Oporos, like to the Father in substance, as others have averred; but God co-equal and co-essential, consubstantial, co-eternal, every way the same God with the Father. For we may observe all along in Scripture how the same names and properties, the same works and honour, which is given to the Father, is in the same manner given to the Son too; as the Father is called Hos. 1. 7. Jehovah in Scripture, so is the Son, b: as the Joh. 1. 1; Father is called God, so is the Son and Omega, the "First and the Last," so is the Son: as the Isa. 9. 6. Father is Eternal, so is the Son: as the Father is Almighty, Heb. 1. 3. so is the Son as the Father is every where, so is the Son: Matt. 8. 20. as the Father knoweth all things, so doth the Son Father made all things, so did the Son: as the preserves all things, so doth the Son: as the Father

Joh. 23.28;

as the Father is Alpha Rom. 9. 5.

as the

Rev. 1. 8.

John 1. 48.

Joh. 21. 17.

John 1. 3.

Father Heb. 1.3.

for- Matt. 9. 2.

gives sins, so doth the Son as the Father is to be wor- Heb. 1.6. shipped, so is the Son as the Father is to be honoured, so is John 5. 23. the Son. No wonder therefore, that Christ, "Being in the Phil. 2. 6. form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God." He did not rob God of any glory by saying that Himself was in all things equal to Him. The greatest wonder of all is, how any one can believe the Scriptures, or at least profess to do so, and yet deny this great truth, that Christ is really and truly God; than which nothing is more frequently, more clearly, more evidently asserted in Holy Scripture. And if there was no other in all the Scriptures, my very text, compared with what follows, is a clear demonstration of it: for here St. Paul tells the gaoler, that if he "believed on Jesus Christ, he should be saved;" and then expounded to him Who this Jesus Christ was. And when he had heard St. Paul preaching upon this subject, it is said, that the gaoler "believed in God, with all his house;" which plainly shews, that St. Paul, assisted by the Holy Ghost, convinced the gaoler, that that Christ, Which he was to believe in, was God: for

CXXXII.

SERM. otherwise, why should he be said to believe in God, who was before advised to believe only in Christ, if believing in Christ, and believing in God, had not been one and the same thing? From whence, therefore, it is not only certain that Christ is God, but that it is necessary also that we believe Him to be so for the Apostle, doubtless, did not entertain the gaoler with any impertinent discourse, but only with what was necessary for his Salvation. But it is plain, that he then told and proved unto him, that Christ was God; and therefore the belief of this, must needs be necessary for our Salvation and the reason is, because unless we believe that Christ is God, we cannot rightly believe Him to be our Saviour; none being able to free us from our sins, but only He against whom they were committed, nor to satisfy for the offences which we have committed against the Infinite God, but He Who is Himself infinite: and therefore none can doubt of Christ's Divinity, and yet expect pardon and Salvation from Him, all our hopes and expectations from Him depending only upon His assumption of our human nature into His Divine Person, which could not have been, was He not a Divine Person which did assume it.

2. As He was God, so was He man too: God of the same essence with the Father, and man of the same nature with us; equal to the Father in every thing, His personal properties only excepted; and like unto us in every thing, our sinful infirmities only excepted. For as He is expressly 1 Tim. 2. 5. called God, so He is expressly called man too; "For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus." But I need not stand to prove this, none ever having denied it, but only some few heretics in the primitive times, who being thoroughly convinced that He was truly God, and not being able to imagine how He should be man too, they fancied Him to be man only iv pavracía, not truly man, but only a kind of an apparition in the likeness 36, 37, 38. of man, such a one as the Apostles themselves thought Him to be after His resurrection, till He had convinced them of the contrary. And if any of you should doubt how this should be, that He Who was God should become man too; Luke 1.35. you may be satisfied with the answer which the Angel gave to the blessed Virgin.

Luke 24.

3. As He was God and man, so He was both God and man in One and the same person: not one person as God, and another person as man, as the Nestorians of old thought, but one and the same person, both as God and man. And the reason was, because He did not assume the person of any man, but only the nature of man in general, which had no subsistence out of the Divine Person Who assumed it, and therefore could not constitute a person of itself, distinct from the person of the Son; but both the natures, the Divine and human, were so united together as still to constitute but one person: upon which hypostatical union of our nature to the Divine person, the meritoriousness and efficacy of Christ's death depends, because it was the death Acts 20. 28. of Him Who was truly God.

Thus therefore it is, that we should think of Christ as of one who was really and truly God, really and truly man, and yet really and truly but one Christ, or one Person, not properly compounded of two natures, but one in whom the Divine and human nature were united; not so as to be blended or confounded together, not so united as to make but one nature after their union, as the Eutychians affirmed, but so as still to remain two distinct natures, though in one and the same person. Even as in the glorious Trinity there be three distinct Persons, and yet but one nature; so in Christ there be two distinct natures, and yet but one Person.

Now, if you do but keep this the true notion of Christ's Person in your minds, you will easily apprehend the natures, extent, and end of those Offices which he was pleased to undertake and perform for mankind; which now come in the next place to be considered. For which we must know, that his Office in general was to be the Mediator betwixt God and Man, to reconcile God to us, and us to God, and so to be a second Adam, raised up to repair the losses which we sustain in the first. For which end it was necessary He should be both God and man, that He might mediate between both parties, and bring them together again, by making up the breach which was betwixt them. For, having first united both their natures in one person, He was thereby fully and completely qualified to unite

CXXXII.

SERM. them together in love and affection too. For the accomplishment whereof, He divided His office of Mediatorship in general into three particular branches, and undertook to be our Priest, our Prophet, and our King, which are all imported in the names ordinarily given Him in Holy Scripture, being called Jesus Christ our Lord. For His name Jesus denotes His Priestly office, whereby He saved us from our sins by offering up Himself as a sacrifice for them: His name Christ, that is, anointed, imports His being anointed and sent to be our Prophet, to reveal the will and pleasure of His Father to us: and then He is called our Lord, that is, King and Governor, to exercise dominion over us, and so to lead us to everlasting life. But seeing all our expectations from Him are grounded upon His execution of these three offices for us, it will be necessary to explain them more particularly to you.

First, therefore, He was our Priest, yea, our High Priest, Heb. 5.5, 6. constituted and appointed by God Himself, so that He was a Priest not after the Levitical Order, which was only a type of His, but after the Order of Melchisedech, which exceeded the Levitical in several particulars, especially in the continuance of it. For though we read of Melchi

Gen. 14. 18. sedech's being the Priest of the Most High God, we do not read of his father or mother, of his beginning nor ending; we read of none that preceded him in his Priesthood, nor yet of any till Christ that succeeded him, so as the Priests in the Levitical law succeeded one another, the Priesthood being entailed there upon Aaron's posterity, and so descending down from father to son, from one generation to anoHeb. 7. 3. ther: whereas "Melchisedech was without father, without

mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God, abideth a Priest continually:" for so Christ exactly was; without father, as to His manhood; without mother, as to His Godhead; without descent, having no predecessors in His priesthood, nor successors neither, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but He always was, and always will be a Priest for ever. And there are two parts of His Priestly office which Christ performed for us:

1. He executed His Priestly office, by making atone