Heb. 2. 14. 1 Cor. 15. [26.] Mat. 22. 43, 44. 2. By subduing Satan, and shortening his power. "I saw Satan fall from Heaven." 3. By conquering death itself, "the last enemy to be destroyed." 4. By erecting a universal power. 1. In respect of all Dan. 7. 14. ages. 2. Over all men. 3. Over all creatures. Eph. 1. 21, 22. Eph. 5. 24. Joh. 16. 24. Ps. 2. 11,12. Phil. 2. 12. Col. 1. 20, 22. Our duties to His Kingly Office are, 1. That we be obedient faithful subjects to this King. 4. That we pay Him His tribute of honour and reverence. ments. 3. Of Christ's Priestly Office. Christ's Priestly Office consists in this, that He did expiate Rom. 5. 10. God's anger, and reconcile us to God. This His priesthood Heb. 7. 17, was not legal, "but after the order of Melchisedech." this office He executes, 21. Isa. 53. 10. Mat 26. 1 Joh. 2. 2. Acts 3. 26. Heb. 4. 16. Phil. 3. 7. Joh. 5. 4. 2 Cor. 6.1,2. Heb. 12. 15; 10. 25-30. Gen. 14. 19, 20. Joh. 1.1.14. Rom. 9. 5. 1. By offering His soul a sacrifice for sin. 2. By His intercession and praying for us. 3. By making an atonement for us. And 4. By blessing us: and this blessing is the turning every one of us from our iniquities. Our duties to this His Priestly Office. 1. To pray Him to intercede for pardon and grace for us. 2. To account His grace the greatest blessing. 3. To receive it, when it flows, with humble hearts. 4. To use His grace to the end designed, viz. reformation. 5. To expect no pardon from this our High-Priest, or eternal salvation, but upon the good use of His grace. 6. That we bless God again, for blessing us. So did Melchisedech. His only Son. That is Christ's third title in the Creed, by which we are 1Joh. 5. 20. to understand that He was the eternal Son of God, not as Isa. 9, 6. all creatures are by creation; nor as all the elect people of Heb. 1. 3. God are, by grace and adoption; but the only Son of God by Mich. 5. 2. eternal generation. Co-eternal, co-essential, and co-equal Phil. 2. 6. with the Father and the Holy Ghost. Very God of very God, begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father. The use for our Comfort. 1. That being God, He is able to save to the uttermost. 2. That being His Son, He will adopt us. Our Lord. That is His fourth title. And it is a name of power and relation. Heb. 7. 25. Heb. 2. 10. 1. Of sovereignty and power, and so is a farther illustration of His Kingly office, that He is exalted to the throne, and therefore hath power to save. At His birth the Angel gives Him this title, "Christ the Lord." And after His Lu. 2. 11. resurrection, St. Peter tells the Jews "That God hath exalted Acts 5. 31. Him with His right hand, to be a Prince and a Saviour." Not a temporal Saviour, as other princes, lords, and christs had been; but a Lord that brings everlasting salvation. 1. A Lord able to save. 1. Himself and others. 2. The bodies and souls of His servants. Heb. 5. 9. Heb. 7. 25-27. [Zech.9. 9. marg.] Heb. 10. 14. Joh. 6. 37, 39,40. Eph. 3. Not only from carnal, but ghostly enemies. 2. A Lord able to give whatsoever He is Lord of. 2. And secondly, Lord is a name of relation, for a lord must have servants: and in this sense it may well be taken here, intimating that however He be the Lord paramount and absolute, yet to all Christians He stands in a nearer relation. Not a Lord at large, but their peculiar, proper Lord. Col. 2. 1 Cor. 2. 8. Mat. 25. 21. 'Our Lord;' not so to the devils; for say they, "What have we to do with Thee?" Not so to the unbelieving Jews or Mat. 8. 29. Gentiles; for to these Jews he was a "stumbling block," and 1 Cor. 1. 23. to these Gentiles "foolishness." To Christians alone, that call Him and own Him for their Lord and Master, to those, 1 Cor. 1. 24. I say, which are called both "Greeks and Jews, Christ is the power of God and wisdom of God." 1 Cor. 7. 23; 6. 19, 20. The uses of His Lordship. 1. That if He be our Lord, then we must be His servants, Mal. 1. 6. obey His commandments, and carry ourselves as it becomes Jas. 4. 12. Isa. 9. 6; 33. 22. Lu. 1. 71. Isa. 32.1, 2. Lu. 1. 35. Mat. 1. 25. Joh. 3. 16. 1 Joh. 4. 9. Lu. 1. 76- Phil. 1. 11. Heb. 7. 3. dutiful servants and subjects. 2. That we acknowledge His power to give laws for the ordering of His kingdom, house, family. 3. That we rely upon this Lord for salvation, for protection, for deliverance, from all the enemies of our peace. II. The second Article concerning Christ. Who was conceived of the Holy Ghost. In this article is set down our Saviour's Incarnation, of which, 1. The efficient cause, was God. 2. The πрonyovμévn, or first moving cause, His good pleasure. 3. Thе πрокатаρêтɩkỳ, or the occasion, man's misery. 4. The final, His own glory, and man's salvation. This His Incarnation, was the assuming of flesh, of which there was a double principle. 1. One in heaven; the Holy Ghost. 2. The other on earth; the Virgin Mary. 1. As He was man, He was ȧπáτwρ, had no man for His father, being not conceived after the ordinary manner of men; Lu. 1. 35. but by the secret power and operations of the Holy Ghost. 2. Yet when He became man, He had a mother, descended Jer. 31. 22. lineally of the seed of David; and she a Virgin, and so the Isa. 7. 14. prophecy fulfilled, "A Virgin shall conceive, and bring forth a Son." Ps. 132.11. Ps. 51. 5. Our nature was polluted with the contagion of sin: that Ezek. 16. 6. therefore this infection might not pass into Christ, He would Lu. 1, 35, be conceived by the Holy Ghost, by whose sanctity the seed, which He took, might be purged from original corruption. Gen 3. 15. [Gal. 4. 4.] Our nature was again to be redeemed by the seed of the woman, as God hath promised; and therefore He took flesh from the Virgin's womb. His conception by the Holy Ghost filled Him with all grace and holiness, "full of grace and truth." Joh. 1. 14. His nativity of the Virgin Mary made Him subject to all Heb.4. 15; human infirmities, that are not sinful. This was the first step and degree of His debasement and humiliation, for quid sublimius Deo? quid vilius carne? what higher than God? what more mean than flesh? and yet the Word would be made flesh. 5. 2. [Joh. 1. 14.] Isa. 9. 3. Lu. 2. 10.11. The duties we learn from it are, 1. Joy. "Behold I bring you glad tidings of great joy." 2. Praise. At His birth the angels sing " Glory in the highest." The shepherds praise God. At His conception Lu. 1. 46Mary her Magnificat. 20. 55.] 3. Humility. Deus humilis et superbit homo? is God Phil. 2. humble and man proud? 3-12. 4. The justice and necessity of our new birth: justice, by way of retaliation: necessity, "for except a man be born Joh. 3. 5. again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." Joh. 3. 6-8. 5. The principles of this our new birth are, the Spirit of Tit. 3. 5. God, and the heart of man. For as Christ's birth proceeded Heb. 8. 10. from two principles, the one active, which was the Holy Ghost; the other passive, viz. the Virgin's womb; so our new birth must have both these principles also. The active, which is the secret operation of God's Spirit, and the passive, in which the work is wrought, which is the heart of man. And that which can prepare and fit the heart for Christ to be born in it, or the Holy Ghost to overshadow it, is the virgin temper, of humility, innocency, submission. It behoves us then humbly to submit to the work of the Spirit, and to prepare virgin hearts for Christ to be born in, and the Holy Ghost to overshadowe. III. The third Article of the Creed. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried; He descended to hell. This is the brief description of the second degree of our Saviour's humiliation, and it comprehends His whole Passion; [e See Hammond, Pract. Catech. Book 5. § 2.] His Agony, Bloody Sweat, His Cross and Passion, Death and Burial. That there is no mention here made of His whole life; but so quick a transition from His birth to His death, the reason is conceived to be, because His life was so humble, and full of misery, that it may well be thought to be a continual suffering. Under this word, then, 'He suffered,' we may well comprehend all His infirmities, His hunger, His thirst, His weariness, His reproaches, His griefs, His sorrows, His temptation, the gainsaying of sinners, which He sustained. This article is especially to be understood, because upon 1 Cor. 2. 2. His death the whole hinge of our salvation turns. "I desire Isa. 53. 10. 17, 18. to know nothing but Jesus Christ crucified." And it needs no long exposition, for that the whole history of it is so clearly and fully set forth by the evangelists; yet these particulars would be remembered. 1. Who it is that suffered, Jesus Christ the Son of God. 2. That He suffered freely, and voluntarily. 3. What He suffered, the wrath, though not the whole Lam. 1. 12. wrath of God. Mat. 26.38. 4. That these His sufferings were not only in His body, but also extended to His soul. Mat. 27. 5. That He suffered the death of the Cross, which was [Deu.21.23. a painful, shameful, bloody, accursed death. Lu. 23. Gal. 3. 13.] 6. Under whom He suffered, viz. Pontius Pilate, the Mat. 27.2. deputy at that time of Judea, under Tiberius. Although He were God, yet He submitted to a legal power. Mat. 27. 50. 7. That He submitted to the separation of His soul from His body, or the power of death. 'He was crucified, dead.' 8. Nay, He yet went one degree lower, for He was laid up Isa. 53. 9. in the heart of the earth. Buried He was, though "He made His grave with the rich." Mat. 27. 57-60. Rom. 5. 6-10. 9. The motive of His suffering; no worth in us, nor no merit on our part, but the bowels of His infinite charity and mercy. 10. The end that He suffered; not for any commodity to Himself, but merely for our good and benefit; which is in the Scriptures expressed in divers words, that import the same things: as, |