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Part 7
And is it not yet further encouraging to you that hitherto He hath mercifully continued you under the means of light? Why is not the light of the gospel put out? Why are times and seasons of grace continued to you if God had no further design of good to your soul? Be not therefore discouraged, but wait on the Lord in the use of means that you may be healed. If you ask, what can we do to put ourselves into the way of the Spirit in order to such a cure? I say, though you cannot make the gospel effectual, yet the Spirit of God can make the means you are capable of using effectual. And it is certain that your inability to do what is above your power in no way excuses you from doing what is within your power.
Let me therefore advise that you diligently attend upon an able, faithful, and searching ministry. Neglect no opportunity God affords you, for how know you, but that may be the time of mercy to your soul. Satisfy not yourselves with hearing, but consider what you hear.
Allow time to reflect upon what God has spoken to you. What power is there in man more excellent or more appropriate to the reasonable nature than its reflective and self-considering power? There is little hope of any good to be done upon your soul till you begin to go alone and reflect. Here all conversion begins.
I know a severe task can hardly be imposed upon a carnal heart. It is a hard thing to bring a man and himself together upon this subject, but this must be, if ever the Lord do your souls good. Commune with your own heart.
Psalm 4 verse 4 Labor to see and confess the insufficiency of all your other knowledge to do you good. What if you had never so much skill and knowledge in other mysteries? What if you be never so well acquainted with the letter of the scriptures? What if you had an angelical illumination? This can never save the soul. No, all thy knowledge avails nothing till the Lord show thee thy special light, the deplorable sight of thine own heart, and the saving sight of Jesus Christ, thine only remedy.
Number 4 Since then there is a common light and special saving light which none but Christ can give. It is the concern of every one of you to try what your light is. We know, saith the Apostle, 1 Corinthians 8 verse 1, that we all have knowledge.
Oh, but what and whence is it? Is it the light of life springing from Jesus Christ, that bright and morning star, or only such as the devils and damned have? These lights differ in their very kind and nature. The one is heavenly, supernatural, and spiritual. The other earthly and natural, the effect of a better constitution or education.
James 3 verses 15 and 17 They differ most apparently in their effects and operations. The light that comes in a special way from Christ is humbling and self-abasing. By it a man sees the vileness of his own nature and practice, which begets self-loathing.
But natural light, on the contrary, puffs up, exhausts, and makes the heart swell with self-conceit. 1 Corinthians 8 verse 1 The light of Christ is practical and operative, still urging the soul, yet lovingly constraining it to obedience. No sooner did it shine into Paul's heart, but presently he asks, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? Acts 9 verse 6 It brought forth fruit in the Colossians from the first day it came to them.
Colossians 1 verse 6 But the other spends itself in intellectual dreams and is detained in unrighteousness. Romans 1 verse 18 The light of Christ powerfully transforms its subjects, changing the man into the same image from glory to glory. 2 Corinthians 3 verse 18 But common light leaves the heart as dead, as carnal and sensual, as if no light at all were in it.
In a word, all saving light endears Jesus Christ to the soul, and, as it could not value him before it saw him, so when once he appears to the soul in his own light, he is appreciated and endeared unspeakably. Then its language is, None but Christ, all is but droth that I may win Christ, none in heaven but him, nor in earth desirable in comparison of him. But no such effect flows from natural common knowledge.
These lights differ in their results. Natural common knowledge vanishes as the apostle speaks. 1 Corinthians 13 verse 8 It is but a May flower and dies in its month.
Doth not their excellency that is in them go away? Job 4 verse 21 But this that springs from Christ is perfected, not destroyed by death. It springs up into everlasting life. The soul in which it is subjected carries it away with it into glory.
This light is life eternal. John 17 verse 3 Now turn in and compare yourselves with these rules. Let not false light deceive you.
Number 5 Lastly, how ought they to love, serve, and honor Jesus Christ, whom he hath enlightened with the saving knowledge of himself? O, that, with hands and hearts lifted up to heaven, ye would adore the free grace of Jesus Christ to your souls! How many round about you have their eyes closed and their hearts shut up? How many are in darkness and likely to remain so till they come to the blackness of darkness which is reserved for them? O, what a pleasant thing it is for your eyes to see the light of this world! But what is it for the eye of your mind to see God in Christ, to see such ravishing sights as the objects of faith, and to have such a pledge as this given you of the blessed visions of glory? For in this light you shall see light. Bless God, and boast not. Rejoice in your light, but be not proud of it.
And beware ye sin not against the best and highest light in the world. If God were so incensed against the heathen for disobeying the light of nature, what is it in you to sin with eyes clearly illuminated with the purest light that shines in the world? You know God charges it upon Solomon, 1 Kings 11 verse 9, that he turned from the way of obedience after the Lord had appeared to him twice. Jesus Christ intended, when he opened your eyes, that your eyes should direct your feet.
Light is a special help to obedience, and obedience is a singular help to increase your light. Chapter 11, page 127. Nature and Necessity of the Priesthood of Christ It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifice than these.
Hebrews 9, verse 23. Salvation, as to the actual dispensation of it, is revealed by Christ as a prophet, procured by him as a priest, applied by him as a king. In vain it is revealed if not purchased, in vain revealed and purchased if not applied.
How is it revealed both to us and in us by our great prophet has been shown. And now from the prophetical office we pass on to the priestly office of Jesus Christ, who as our priest purchased our salvation. In this office is contained the grand relief for a soul distressed by the guilt of sin.
When all other reliefs have been tried, it is the blood of this great sacrifice, sprinkled by faith upon the trembling conscience, that must cool, refresh, and sweetly compose and settle it. Now seeing so great a weight hangs upon this office, the apostle industriously confirms and commends it in this epistle, and more especially in this ninth chapter, showing how it was prefigured to the world by the typical blood of the sacrifices, but infinitely excels them all. And as in many other most weighty respects, so principally in death, that the blood of these sacrifices did but purify the types or patterns of the heavenly things.
But the blood of this sacrifice purified or consecrated the heavenly things themselves, signified by those types. These words contain an argument to prove the necessity of the offering of Christ the great sacrifice, drawn from the proportion between the types and the things typified. If the sanctuary, mercy seat, and all things pertaining to the service of the tabernacle were to be consecrated by blood, those earthly but sacred types by the blood of bulls and lambs, much more the heavenly things shadowed by them ought to be purified or consecrated by better blood than the blood of beasts.
The blood consecrating these should as much excel the blood that consecrated those as the heavenly things themselves do, in their own nature, excel those earthly shadows of them. Mark what proportion there is between the type and the antitype. Such also is the proportion between the blood that consecrates them, earthly things with common, heavenly things with the most excellent blood.
So then there are two things to be especially observed here. One, the nature of Christ's death and sufferings. It had the nature, use, and end of a sacrifice, and it was of all sacrifices the most excellent.
Two, the necessity of his offering it. It was necessary to correspond with all the types and prefigurations of it under the law, but especially it was necessary for the expiating of sin, propitiating a justly incensed God, and opening a way for us to come to him. Hence, the sacrifice of Christ our High Priest is most excellent in itself, and most necessary for us.
Sacrifices are of two kinds. Eucharistical, or thank offerings, in testimony of homage, duty, and service, and in token of gratitude for mercy freely received, and Elastical, or expiatory, for satisfaction to justice, and thereby reconciling God. Of this last kind was the sacrifice offered by Christ for us.
To this office he was called by God. Hebrews 5, 5 In it he was confirmed by the unchangeable oath of God. Psalm 110, 4 For it he was singularly qualified by his incarnation.
Hebrews 10, 6, 7 And all the ends of it he has fully answered. Hebrews 9, 11, 12 My present design is to show the general nature, and the absolute necessity of the priesthood of Christ, in order to our recovery from our deplorable state of sin and misery. Roman numeral 1 We will consider what it supposes and implies, and wherein it consists.
Number 1 It supposes man's revolt and fall from God, and a dreadful breach made thereby between God and him, else no need of an atoning sacrifice. If one died for all, then were all dead. 2 Corinthians 5, 14 Dead in law, under sentence to die, and that eternally.
In all the sacrifices from Adam to Christ, this was still preached to the world, that there was a fearful breach between God and man, and therefore that justice required our blood should be shed. And the fire flaming on the altar, which holy burnt up that sacrifice, was a lively emblem of that fiery indignation that should devour the adversaries. But above all, when Christ, the true and great sacrifice, was offered up to God, the clearest mirror was set before us in which to see our sin and misery by the fall.
Number 2 His priesthood supposes the unalterable purpose of God to take vengeance for sin. He will not let it pass. I will not pretend to say what God could do in this case, but I think it is generally yielded that he must punish it in the person of the sinner, or in his surety.
Those that contend for such a forgiveness as in an act of charity, like that whereby private persons forgive one another, must at once suppose God to part with his right and also render the satisfaction of Christ altogether useless as to the procurement of forgiveness, yea, rather an obstacle than a means to it. Surely the nature and truth of God oblige him to punish sin. He is of purer eyes than to look on iniquity.
Habakkuk 1 verse 13 And besides, the word is gone out of his mouth that the sinner shall die. Number 3 The priesthood of Christ presupposes the utter impotency of man to appease God and recover his favor by anything he could do or suffer. Surely God would not come down to assume a body to die and be offered for us if at any cheaper rate it could have been accomplished.
There was no other way to recover man and satisfy God. Those that deny the satisfaction of Christ and talk of his dying to confirm the truth and give us an example of meekness, patience and self-denial, affirming these to be the sole ends of his death, do not only therein root up the foundations of their own comfort, peace and pardon, but most boldly impeach infinite wisdom. God could have done all this at a cheaper rate.
The sufferings of a mere creature are able to attain these ends. The death of the martyrs did it. But who by dying can satisfy and reconcile God? What creature can bring him inadequate and proportionable value for sin, yea, for all the sin of all the redeemed, from Adam to the last, that shall be found alive at the Lord's coming? Surely none but Christ can do this.
Number four. Christ's priesthood implies the necessity of his being God's man. It was necessary he should be a man in order to his suffering, his compassion and the application of his righteousness and holiness to man.
Had he not been man, he had no sacrifice to offer, no soul or body in which to suffer. The Godhead is immortal and above all those sufferings and miseries which Christ felt for us. Besides his being man fills him with bowls of compassion and a tender sense of our miseries.
This makes him a merciful and faithful high priest, Hebrews 4.15, and not only fits him to pity, but to sanctify us also. For he that sanctifyeth and they that are sanctified are both of one. Hebrews 2 verses 11, 14 and 17.
And equally necessary was it that our high priest should be God since the value and efficacy of his sacrifice results from thence. Number five. The priesthood of Christ implies the extremity of his sufferings.
In sacrifices you know there was a destruction, a kind of annihilation of the creature to the glory of God. The shedding of the creature's blood and burning its flesh with fire was but an umbrage or faint resemblance of what Christ endured when he made his soul an offering for sin. Number six.
It implies the gracious design of God to reconcile us at a dear rate to himself in that he called and confirmed Christ in his priesthood by an oath and thereby provided a sacrifice of infinite value for the world. Sins for which no sacrifice is allowed are desperate sins and the case of such sinners is helpless. But if God allow, yea, and provide a sacrifice himself, how plainly does it speak his intentions of peace and mercy? These things are manifestly presupposed or implied in Christ's priesthood.
This priesthood of Christ is that function wherein he comes before God in our name and place to fulfill the law and offer up himself to him a sacrifice of reconciliation for our sins and by his intercession to continue and apply the purchase of his blood to them for whom he shed it. All this is contained in that important scripture, Hebrews 10, verses 7-14. Or more briefly, the priesthood of Christ is that whereby he expiated the sins of men and obtained the favor of God for them.
Colossians 1, verses 20 and 22 and Romans 5, verse 10. But because I shall insist more largely upon the several parts and fruits of this office, it shall here suffice to speak this much as to its general nature, which was the first thing proposed for explication. Roman numeral two.
The necessity of Christ's priesthood comes next to be considered. It was according to the scriptures necessary in order to our salvation that such a priest should, by such a sacrifice, appear before God for us. This appears from two principles which are evident in scripture.
That God required full satisfaction and that fallen man is totally incapable of tendering him any such satisfaction. Therefore Christ, who only could, must do it or we perish. Number one.
God required full satisfaction and would not remit one sin without it. This will be clearly proved from the nature of sin and from the veracity and wisdom of God. Such is the nature of sin that the sinner deserves to suffer for it.
Penal evil, in a course of justice, follows moral evil. Sin and sorrow ought to go together. There is between these a necessary connection.
The wages of sin is death. Roman six twenty three. The veracity of God requires it.
The word is gone out of his mouth. In the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Genesis two verse seventeen.
From that time man was instantly and certainly obnoxious and liable to the death of soul and body. The law pronounces him cursed that continues not in all things written therein to do them. Galatians three ten.
Now though man's threatenings are often vain and insignificant, God's shall surely take place. Not one tittle of the law shall fail till all be fulfilled. Matthew five eighteen.
God will be true in all his threatenings though thousands and millions perish. The wisdom of God, by which he governs the rational world, admits not of a dispensation or relaxation of the threatenings without satisfaction. For as well no king, as no laws for government.
As well no law, as no penalty. And as well no penalty, as no execution. To this purpose one observes, it is altogether unfitting, especially to the wisdom and righteousness of God, that that which provoketh the execution should procure the abrogation of his law, that that should suppliant and undermine the law, for preventing of which alone the law was before established.
How could it be expected that men should fear and tremble before God when they should find that his threats against sin were vain? So then God required satisfaction and would admit no treaty of peace on any other ground. Let none here object that reconciliation upon this only ground of satisfaction is derogatory to the riches of grace, or that we allow not God what we do men, namely, to forgive an injury freely without satisfaction. Free forgiveness to us and full satisfaction made to God by Jesus Christ for us are not things inconsistent with each other, as in its proper place shall be more fully shown.
And as for denying that to God which we allow to men, you must know that man and man stand on even ground. Man is not capable of being wronged and injured by man as God is by man. There is no comparison between the nature of the offenses.
Besides, man only can freely forgive man in a private capacity, so far as the wrong concerns himself. But he ought not to do so in a public capacity as he is judged and bound to execute justice impartially. God is our lawgiver and judge.
He will not only dispense with violations of the law, but strictly demand complete satisfaction. 2. Man can render to God no satisfaction of his own for the wrong done by his sin. He finds no way to compensate and make God amends, either by doing or by suffering his will.
Not by doing. This way is shut up to all the world. None can satisfy God or reconcile himself to Him in this way.
For it is evident our best works are sinful. All our righteousness is as filthy rags. Isaiah 64 verse 6. And it is strange any should imagine that one sin should make satisfaction for another.
If it be said that not what is sinful in our duties, but what is spiritual, pure, and good, may ingratiate us with God, it is obvious to reply that what is good in any of our duties is a debt we owe to God. Yea, we owe Him perfect obedience, and it is not imaginable how we should pay one debt by another. Cancel a former by contracting a new engagement.
If we do anything that is good we are indebted to grace for it. John 15 verse 5. 2 Corinthians 3 verse 5. 1 Corinthians 15 verse 10. In a word, those that have had as much to plead as any now living have utterly given up all hope of appeasing and satisfying the justice of God.
It is likely that holy Job feared God and eschewed evil as much as any of you. Yet he saith, If I justify myself, mine own mouth shall condemn me. If I say I am perfect, it shall also prove me perverse.
Though I were perfect, yet would I not know my soul, I would despise my life. Job 9 verses 20 and 21. It is probable that David was a man as much after the heart of God as you, yet he said, Enter not into judgment with thy servant, for in thy sight shall no man be justified.
Psalm 143 verse 2. It is likely that Paul lived as holy, heavenly, and fruitful a life as the best of you, and far, far beyond you. Yet he saith, I know, or am conscious to myself of, nothing, yet I am not hereby justified. 1 Corinthians 4 verse 4. His sincerity might comfort him, but could not justify him.
And what need I say more? The Lord hath shut up this way to all the world, and the scriptures speak it plainly. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight. Romans 3 verse 20.
Compare Galatians 3 verse 21. Romans 8 verse 3. And as man can never reconcile himself to God by doing, so neither by suffering. This is equally impossible.
For no sufferings can satisfy God, but such as are proportionable to the offense we suffer for. And if so, infinite sufferings must be born. I say infinite, for sin is an infinite evil, as it wrongs an infinite God.
Now sufferings may be said to be infinite, either in respect to their weight, exceeding all bounds and limits, the letting out of the wrath and fury of an infinite God, or in respect to duration, being endless and everlasting. In the first sense no creature can bear infinite wrath, it would swallow us up. In the second it may be born as the damned do, but then ever to be suffering is never to be satisfied.
So that no man can be his own priest to reconcile himself to God by what he can do or suffer. And therefore one that is able, by doing and suffering, to reconcile him, must undertake it, or we perish. Thus you see plainly and briefly the general nature and necessity of Christ's priesthood.
Inference 1. This shows the incomparable excellency of the Christian religion. What other religions seek, the Christian religion alone finds, even a solid foundation for true peace of conscience. While the Jew seeks it in vain in the law, the Mohammedan in his external and ridiculous observances, and the Papist in his own merits, the believer only finds it in the blood of this great sacrifice.
This and nothing less than this can give peace to a distressed conscience, laboring under the weight of its own guilt. Conscience demands no less to satisfy it than God demands to satisfy Him. The grand inquest of conscience is, is God satisfied? If He be satisfied, I am satisfied.
Woeful is the state of that man that feels the worm of conscience gnawing the most tender part of the soul, and hath no relief against it, that feels the intolerable scalding wrath of God burning within, and hath nothing to cool it. Hear me, you that slight the troubles of conscience, that call them fancies and melancholy, if you had but one sick night for sin, if you had ever felt that shame, fear, horror, and despair, which are the effects of an accusing and condemning conscience, you would have counted an unspeakable mercy to hear of a way for the discharge of a poor sinner from that guilt. You would kiss the feet of the messenger that could bring you tidings of peace.
You would call him blessed that should direct you to an effectual remedy. Now whoever thou art that pinest away in thine iniquities, that droopest from day to day under the present wounds and the dismal presages of conscience, know that thy soul and peace can never meet till thou art persuaded to come to this blood of sprinkling. The blood of this sacrifice speaks better things than the blood of Abel.
The blood of this sacrifice is the blood of God. Acts 20.28 Invaluably precious blood. 1 Peter 1.19 One drop of it infinitely excels the blood of all mere creatures.
Hebrews 10 verses 4-6 Such is the blood that must do thee good. Lord, I must have such blood, sayeth conscience, as is capable of giving thee full satisfaction, or it can give me no peace. The blood of the cattle upon a thousand hills cannot do this.
What is the blood of beasts to God? The blood of all the men in the world can do nothing in this case. What is our polluted blood worth? Yea, Christ's blood is not only the blood of God, but it is bloodshed in thy stead and in thy place and room. He was made a curse for us.
Galatians 3.13 And so it becomes sin pardoning blood. Hebrews 9.22 Ephesians 1.7 Colossians 1.14 Romans 3.26 And consequently, conscience pacifying and soul quieting blood. Colossians 1.20 Ephesians 2.13-14 Romans 3.25 O bless God that ever the news of this blood came to thine ears.
With hands and eyes lifted up to heaven, admire that grace that cast thy lot in a place where this joyful sound rings in the ears of poor sinners. Surely the pure light of the gospel shining upon this generation is a mercy never to be enough prized. Number 2 Hence also learn the necessity of faith in order to a state and sense of peace with God.
For to what purpose is the blood of Christ our sacrifice shed, unless it be actually and personally applied and appropriated by faith? You know, when a sacrifice under the law was brought to be slain, he that brought it was to put his hand upon the head of the sacrifice, and so it was accepted for him to make an atonement. Leviticus 1.4 Not only to signify that now it was no more his, but God's, the property being transferred by a kind of manumission, nor yet merely that he voluntarily gave it to the Lord as his own free act, but principally it signified the putting off of his sins and the penalty due to him for them upon the head of the sacrifice. And so it implied in an execration, as if he had said, Upon thy head be the evil.
So the learned observe the ancient Egyptians were wont expressly to imprecate when they sacrificed, If any evil be coming upon us or upon Egypt, let it turn and rest upon this head, laying their hand at these words on the sacrifice's head. And upon that ground said Herodotus the historian, None of them would eat of the bread of any living creature. You must also lay the hand of faith upon Christ your sacrifice, not to imprecate, but to apply and appropriate him to your own souls, he having been made a curse for you.
To this the whole gospel tends, even to persuade sinners to apply Christ and his blood to their own souls. To this he invites us, Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11, 28 For this end our sacrifice was lifted up upon the altar.
As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3, verses 14 and 15 The effects of the law, not only upon the conscience, filling it with torment, but upon the whole person, bringing death upon it, are here shadowed out by the stingings of fiery serpents, and Christ by the brazen serpent which Moses exalted for the Israelites that were stung to look unto. And as by looking to it they were healed, so by believing, or looking to Christ in faith, our souls are healed.
Those that look not to the brazen serpent died infallibly. So must all that look not by faith to Jesus our sacrifice. It is true the death of Christ is the meritorious cause of remission, but faith is the instrumental, applying cause.
And as Christ's blood is necessary in its place, so is our faith also in its place. The death of Christ, the offer and tender of Christ, never in themselves saved one soul without being received by faith. But alas, how do I see sinners, either not at all touched with the sense of sin, and so feeling that they are whole and need not the physician? Or if any be stung and wounded with guilt, how do they look themselves whole with their own duties and reformations? Physicians say of wounds, let them be kept clean, and nature will find balm of its own to heal them.
If it were so in spiritual wounds, what need Christ to have left the Father's bosom and come down to die as a sacrifice for us? Oh, if men can but have health, pleasure, riches, honor, and any way still a disturbing conscience that it may not check or interrupt them in these enjoyments, they care nothing for Christ. And I am assured, till God show you the face of sin in the glass of the law, make the scorpions and fiery serpents that lurk in the law and in your consciences come hissing about you, and smiting you with their deadly stings. Till you have had some sick nights and sorrowful days for sin, you will never go up and down seeking an interest in the blood of His sacrifice with tears.
But reader, if ever this be thy condition, then wilt thou know the worth of a Savior. Then wilt thou value the blood of sprinkling. Number 3 Is Christ your High Priest, and is His priesthood so indispensably necessary to our salvation? Then freely acknowledge your utter impotency to reconcile yourselves to God by anything you can do or suffer, and let the whole glory of your recovery be ascribed to Christ.
It is highly reasonable that He that laid down the whole price should have the whole praise. If any man say or think he could have made an atonement for himself, he doth therein cast no light reproach upon that profound wisdom which laid the design of our redemption in the death of Christ. But of this I have spoken elsewhere.
And therefore, number 4, in the last place, I rather choose to persuade you to see your necessity of this High Priest and His most excellent sacrifice, and accordingly to make use of it. The best of you have polluted natures, poisoned with sin. Those natures have need of this sacrifice.
They must have the benefit of this blood to pardon and cleanse them, or else be eternally damned. Hear me, ye that never spent a tear for the sin of your nature. If the blood of Christ be not sprinkled upon your natures, it had been better for you that you had been the offspring of beasts or of dragons.
They have a mean, but not a vitiated sinful nature as you have. Your actual sins have need of the great High Priest and His sacrifice to procure remission for them. If He take them not away by the blood of His cross, they can never be taken away.
They will lie down with you in the dust. They will rise with you and follow you to the judgment seat, crying, We are thy works, and we will follow thee. All thy repentance and tears, couldst thou weep as many as there be drops in the ocean, can never take away sin.
Thy duties, even the best of them, need this sacrifice. It is in virtue thereof that they are accepted of God. And were it not that God had respect to Christ's offering, He would not regard thee, nor any of thy duties.
Thou couldst no more come near to God than thou couldst approach a devouring fire, or dwell with everlasting burning. Well, then I say, I need such a price every way. Love Him in all His offices.
See the goodness of God in providing such a sacrifice for thee. Meat, drink, and air are not more necessary to maintain thy natural life than the death of Christ is to give and maintain thy spiritual life. Oh, then let thy soul expand while meditating on the grace and excellency of Christ, which is thus displayed and unfolded in every branch of the gospel.
And with a deep sense upon thy heart, let thy lips say, Blessed be God for Jesus Christ. Chapter 12, page 140 Excellency of our high priest's oblation, the first part of his priestly office. For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified.
Hebrews 10, 14 After this more general view of the priesthood of Christ, we come to a nearer and more particular consideration of the parts thereof, which are his oblation and intercession, answerable to the double office of the high priest, offering the blood of the sacrifices without the holy place, which typified Christ's oblation, and then once a year bringing the blood before the Lord into the most holy place, presenting it before God, and with it sprinkling the mercy seat wherein the intercession of Christ, the other part or act of his priesthood, was in a lively manner typified to us. My present business is to consider the oblation of Christ, the efficacy and excellency of which are illustrated in the context by a comparison with all other oblations, and are with a singular enconium commended to us in the words by one offering. It is but one offering, but once offered, and never more to be repeated, for Christ dieth no more.
Romans 6, 9 He also commends it from its efficacy. He hath perfected it, that is, not only purchased a possibility of salvation, but all that we need to our full perfection. It brings in a most entire, complete, and perfect righteousness, and all that remains to make us perfectly happy is but the full application of the benefits procured by this oblation for us.
Moreover, it is here commended from the extensiveness of it, not being restrained to a few, but applicable to all the saints in all ages and places of the world. Lastly, he commends it from its perpetuity. It perfects forever, that is, it is of everlasting efficacy.
It shall abide as fresh, vigorous, and powerful to the end of the world, as it was the first moment it was offered, all of which affords us this sweet truth, The oblation made unto God by Jesus Christ is of unspeakable value and everlasting efficacy to perfect all them that are or shall be sanctified to the end of the world. Out of this fountain flow all the blessings that believers either have or hope for. Had it not been for this, there had been no such thing as justification, adoption, salvation, peace with God, and hope of glory, pardon of sin, and divine acceptance.
These and all our best mercies had never been. A man, as one saith, might have happily imagined such things as these, as he made golden mountains, and rivers of liquid gold, and rocks of diamonds. But these things could never have had any real existence had not Christ offered up himself a sacrifice to God for us.
It is the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, that purges the conscience from dead works, Hebrews 9.14, that is, from the sentence of condemnation and death inflicted by conscience for our sins. His appearing before God as our priest with such an offering for us is that which removes our guilt and fear together. He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, Hebrews 9.26. Now as the point before us is of so great weight and so fundamental to our safety and comfort, I shall endeavor to give you as distinct and clear an account of it as can consist with that brevity which I must necessarily use.
And therefore, reader, apply thy mind attentively to the consideration of this excellent priest that appears before God, the sacrifice he offers, the person before whom he brings and to whom he offers it, the persons for whom he offers, and the end for which this oblation is made. Roman 1. The priest that appears before God with an oblation for us is Jesus Christ, God-man, the dignity of whose person gave an inestimable worth to the offering he made. There were many priests before him, but none like unto him, either for the purity of his person or the perpetuity of his priesthood.
They were sinful men and offered for their own sins as well as the sins of the people, Hebrews 5.3 But he was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, Hebrews 7.26 He could stand before God, even in the eye of his justice, as a lamb without spot. Though he made his soul an offering for sin, yet he had done no iniquity, nor was any guile found in his mouth, Isaiah 53.9 And indeed his offering had done us no good, if the least taint of sin had been found on him. The Jewish priests were mortal men that continued not by reason of death, Hebrews 7.23 But Christ is a priest forever, Psalm 110.4 Roman numeral 2 The oblation or offering he made was not the blood of beasts, but his own blood, Hebrews 9.12 And herein he transcended all other priests, that he had something of his own to offer.
He had a body given him to be at his own disposal. To this use and purpose he offered his body, Hebrews 10.10 Yea, not only his body, but his soul was made an offering for sin, Isaiah 53.10 We had made a forfeiture of our souls and bodies by sin, and it was necessary the sacrifice of Christ should be answerable to the debt we owed. And when Christ came to offer his sacrifice, he stood not only in the capacity of a priest, but also in that of a surety.
And so his soul stood in the stead of ours, and his body in the stead of our bodies. Now the excellency of this oblation will appear in the following adjuncts and properties of it. This oblation being the soul and body of Jesus Christ is therefore, number one, invaluably precious.
So the apostle styles it, Ye were redeemed with the precious blood of the Son of God, 1 Peter 1.19 And such it behooved him to offer. For it being offered as an expiatory sacrifice, it ought to be equivalent in its own intrinsic value to all the souls and bodies that were to be redeemed by it. And so it was, and more also.
But surely as none but God can estimate the weight and evil of sin, so none but he can comprehend the worth and preciousness of the blood of Christ, shed to expiate it. And being so infinitely precious a thing which was offered up to God, it must needs be, number two, a most complete and all-sufficient oblation, fully to expiate the sins of all for whom it was offered in all ages of the world. This Reformation audio track is a production of Stillwater's Revival Books.
SWRB makes thousands of classic Reformation resources available, free and for sale in audio, video, and printed formats. Our many free resources, as well as our complete mail-order catalog, containing thousands of classic and contemporary Puritan and Reform books, tapes, and videos at great discounts is on the web at www.swrb.com We can also be reached by email at swrb at swrb dot com by phone at 780 450 3730 by fax at 780 468 1096 or by mail at 4710-37A Avenue Edmonton, that's E-D-M-O-N T-O-N Alberta, abbreviated capital A capital B Canada, T-6-L-3-T-5 You may also request a free printed catalog. And remember that John Calvin, in defending the Reformation's regulative principle of worship, or what is sometimes called the scriptural law of worship, commenting on the words of God, which I commanded them not, neither came into my heart.
From his commentary on Jeremiah 7-31, writes, God here cuts off from men every occasion for making evasions, since he condemns by this one phrase, I have not commanded them whatever the Jews devised. There is then no other argument needed to condemn superstitions than that they are not commanded by God. For when men allow themselves to worship God according to their own fancies, and attend not to His commands, they pervert true religion.
And if this principle was adopted by the Papists, all those fictitious modes of worship in which they absurdly exercise themselves would fall to the ground. It is indeed a horrible thing for the Papists to seek to discharge their duties towards God by performing their own superstitions. There is an immense number of them, as it is well known, and as it manifestly appears.
Were they to admit this principle, that we cannot rightly worship God except by obeying His word, they would be delivered from their deep abyss of error. The prophet's words, then, are very important, when he says that God had commanded no such thing, and that it never came to his mind. As though he had said that men assume too much wisdom when they devise what he never required, nay, what he never knew.