The Fountain of Life Opened Up

Yet surely never did any child lie so close to a parent's heart as Christ to his father's, and yet he willingly parts with him, though his only one, the son of his delights. And that to death, a cursed death, for sinners, for the worst of sinners. Oh, the admirable love of God to men, matchless love, a love past finding out. Let all men therefore, in the business of their redemption, give equal glory to the Father with the Son. John 5, 23. If the Father had not loved thee, he had never parted with such a son for thee. 2. From one wonder let our souls turn to another, for they are now in the midst of wonders. Adore and be forever astonished at the love of Jesus Christ to poor sinners, that ever he should consent to leave such a bosom, and the ineffable delights that were there for such poor ones as we are. Oh, the heights, depths, lengths, and breadths of unmeasurable love. See Romans 5, verses 6 through 8. Read and wonder. How is the love of Christ commended to poor sinners? As the Father loved him, even so, believers, hath he loved you. John 17, 23. What manner of love is this? Whoever loved as Christ loved. Whoever denied himself for Christ, as Christ denied himself for us. 3. An interest in Jesus Christ is the true way to all spiritual fulfillment in heaven. Do you covet to be in the heart in the favor and delight of God? Get an interest in Jesus Christ and you shall presently be there. In heaven, persons are preferred according to their interest in the Beloved. Ephesians 1, 6. Christ is the great favorite there. His image upon your souls and his name in your prayers make both accepted with God. 4. How worthy is Jesus Christ of all our love and delight? You see how infinitely the Father delighteth in him, and shall not our hearts delight in him? Oh, that ye did but see this lovely Lord Jesus Christ. 5. Why do ye lavish away your precious affections upon vanity? None but Christ is worthy of them. 6. When ye spend your precious affections upon other objects, what is it but to dig for dross with gold and maddox? The Lord directs our hearts into the love of Christ. 7. Oh, that our hearts, loves, and delights did meet and co-center with the heart of God in this most blessed object. 8. Oh, let him that left God's bosom for you be embosomed by you, though your love be nothing to God's. 9. He that left God's bosom for you deserves yours. 10. If Christ be the beloved of the Father's soul, think what a grievous and insufferable thing it is to the heart of God to see his dear Son despised, slighted, and rejected by sinners. How God will bear this, that parable Matthew 21, verses 33-41 will inform you. Surely he will miserably destroy such wretched sinners. What a dismal word is that! If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema veranatha. 1 Corinthians 16.22 That is, let the great curse of God lie upon that man till the Lord come. Oh, sinners, you shall one day know the cost of this sin. You shall feel what it is to despise a Jesus that is able to compel love from the hardest heart. Oh, that you would slight him no more. Oh, that this day your hearts might fall in love with him. I tell you, if you would set your love to sail, none did so fare for it as Christ. If Christ lay eternally in this bosom of love and yet was content to forsake and leave it for your sake, then, Christians, be you ready to forsake all the comforts you have on earth for Christ. Famous Galatians left all for this enjoyment. Moses left all the glory of Egypt. Peter and the apostles left all. Luke 18.28 But what have we to leave for Christ in comparison with what He left for us? Surely Christ is the highest pattern of self-denial in the world. Let this confirm your faith in prayer. If he that has such an interest in the heart of God intercede with the Father for you, then never doubt of audience and acceptance with him. Surely you shall be accepted through the Beloved. Christ was never denied anything that He asked. The Father always hears Him. John 11.42 Though you are not worthy, Christ is, and He ever lives to make intercession for you. Hebrews 7.25 Let this encourage thy heart, O saint, in a dying hour, and not only make thee patient in death, but in a holy manner impatient till thou be gone. For whither is thy soul now going but to that bosom of love whence Christ came? Father, I will that they whom thou hast given me be with me where I am. John 17.24 And where is he but in that bosom of glory and love where he lay before the world was? Verse 5 O then let every believer encourage his soul. Comfort ye one another with these words. I am leaving the bosom of a creature. I am going to the bosom of God. Sinners, embrace the bosom of God. Poor fellow mortals, whatever you are or have been, under whatever guilt or discouragement you lie, embrace Christ, who is freely offered to you, and you shall be as dear to God as the holiest and most eminent believer in the world. But if you still continue to despise and neglect such a Savior, soreer wrath is treasured up for you than other sinners. Hebrews 10.28-29 O that these discoveries and overtures of Christ may never come to such a fatal issue with any of your souls before whom his glory has been thus opened. Chapter 3, page 32 The Covenant of Redemption Between the Father and the Redeemer Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he hath poured out his soul unto death, and he was numbered with the transgressors, and he bared the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. Isaiah 53.12 In the 53rd of Isaiah, the gospel seems to be epitomized. The subject is the death of Christ and the glorious issue thereof. By reading it, the eunuch of old and many Jews since have been converted to Christ. Christ is here considered absolutely and relatively. Absolutely, and thus his innocency is clearly vindicated. Verse 9 Though he suffered grievous things, yet it was not for his own sins, for he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. But he is considered relatively in the capacity of assurity for us. Thus the justice of God is fully vindicated in his sufferings. The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. Verse 6 How he came to sustain this capacity and relation of assurity for us is in these verses plainly asserted to be by his compact and agreement with his Father before the world were made. Verses 10-12 In this verse we have 1. His work, which was indeed a hard work, to pour out his soul unto death, aggravated by his being, numbered with the transgressors, his bearing the sins of many, and by the manner of his bearing it, namely meekly and forgivingly. He made intercession for the transgressors. This was his work. 2. The reward or fruit which is promised him for this work. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong. Wherein is a plain allusion to conquerors in war, for whom I reserve the richest garments and most honorable captives to follow the conqueror, as an addition to his magnificence and triumph. These will want to come after them in chains. Isaiah 45-14 See Judges 5-30 3. The relation between that work and his triumph. Some will have this work to hold no other relation to that glory than a mere antecedent to a consequent. Others give it the respect and relation of a meritorious cause to a reward. However, it is plain that the Father here agrees and promises to give the elect to the Son if he will undertake their redemption by pouring out his soul unto death, of all which this is the plain result. The business of man's salvation was transacted upon covenant terms between the Father and the Son from all eternities. 1. Consider the persons transacting and dealing with each other in this covenant. And indeed they are great persons, God the Father and God the Son, the former as a creditor and the latter as a surety. The Father claims satisfaction, the Son engages to give it. 2. The business transacted between them, and that was the redemption and recovery of all God's people. Our eternal happiness lay now before them, our dearest and everlasting concerns were now in their hands. The elect, though not yet in being, are here considered as existent, yea, and as fallen, miserable, forlorn creatures. How these may again be restored to happiness without prejudice to the honor, justice, and truth of God! This, this is the business that lay before them. 3. The manner or quality of the transaction was federal, or of the nature of a covenant. It was by mutual engagements and stipulations, each person undertaking to perform his part in order to our recovery. 4. More particularly, we will next consider the articles to which they do both agree, and what it is that each person doth for himself promise to the other. And to let us see how much the Father's heart is engaged in the salvation of poor sinners, there are four things which he promises to do for Christ if he will undertake that work. 1. He promises to invest him and anoint him to a threefold office, answerable to the misery that lay upon the elect, as so many bars to all communion with and enjoyment of God. For if ever man be restored to that happiness, the blindness of his mind must be cured, the guilt of sin expiated, and his captivity to sin led captive. 2. Christ must, of God, be made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. 3. And he is made so to us as our prophet, priest, and king. But he could not put himself into either of these, for if so, he had acted without commission, and consequently all he did had been invalid. Christ glorified not himself to be made a high priest, but he that said unto him, Thou art my son. 4. A commission therefore to act authoritatively in these offices, being necessary to our recovery, the Father engages to him to seal him such a threefold commission. 5. He promises to invest him with an eternal and royal priesthood. The Lord hath sworn and will not repent, thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek. Psalm 110, verse 4 6. This Melchizedek, being king of righteousness and king of Salem, that is, peace, had a royal priesthood, and his descent not being reckoned, it had an unduration of eternity in it, and so was more fit to typify and shadow forth the priesthood of Christ than Aaron was. Hebrews 7, verses 17, 24, and 25 7. He promises, moreover, to make him a prophet, and that an extraordinary one, even the prince of prophets, the chief shepherd, as much superior to all others as the sun is to the lesser stars. So it is said, I will give thee for a light to the Gentiles, to open the blind eyes, etc. Isaiah 42, verses 6 and 7 8. And not only so, but to make him king also, and that of the whole empire of the world. 9. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Psalm 2, verses 8 Thus the father promises to qualify and furnish the son completely for the work by his investiture with his threefold office. 2. He promises to crown his work with success, and bring it to a happy issue. He shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hands. Isaiah 53, verses 10 He shall not begin and not finish, he shall not shed his invaluable blood upon hazardous terms, but shall see and reap the sweet fruits thereof, as the joyful mother forgets her sorrows when she delightfully embraces her living child. 3. The father promises to accept him in his work. Surely sayeth the son, My work is with my God. Isaiah 49, verses 4 And I shall be glorious in the eyes of the Lord. 5. His faith hath very in respect to this compact and promise. Accordingly the father manifests the satisfaction he had in him and in his work, even while he was about it upon the earth. When there came such a voice from the excellent glory, saying, This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. 2 Peter 1, verses 17 4. He engages to reward him highly for his work by exalting him to singular and supereminent glory and honor when he should have dispatched and finished it. So you read, I will declare the decree. The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee. Psalm 2, verses 7 It is spoken of the day of his resurrection, when he had just finished his sufferings, and so the apostle expounds and applies it. Acts 13, verses 32 and 33 So then did the Lord wipe away the reproach of his cross. As if the father had said, Now thou hast again recovered thy glory, and this day is to thee as a new birthday. These are the encouragement and reward proposed and promised to him by the father. This was the joy set before him, as the apostle expresses it in Hebrews 12, verses 2, which made him so patiently endure the cross and despise the shame. And in like manner Jesus Christ gives his engagement to the father, that upon these terms he is to be made flesh, to divest, as it were, himself of his glory, to come under the obedience and malediction of the law, and not to refuse any, the hardest sufferings it should please his father to inflict on him. So much is implied in Isaiah 50, verses 5-7 The Lord hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. I gave my back to the smiters, my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting. For the Lord God will help me, therefore shall I not be confounded. Therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. And the sense of this place is well delivered to us in other terms. Then said I, lo, I come. I delight to do thy will, O God. Thy law is within my heart. Psalm 40, verses 6-10 O see with what a full consent the heart of Christ closes with the Father's offers and proposals, like some echo that answers your voice twice or thrice over. So doth Christ here answer his Father's call. I come. I delight to do thy will. Yea, thy law is in my heart. Roman numeral 5 I will briefly show how these articles and agreements were on the part of both performed, and that precisely and punctually. Number 1 The Son having thus consented, accordingly he applies himself to the discharge of his work. He took a body, and in it fulfilled all righteousness, even to a tittle. Matthew 3, verse 15 And at last his soul was made an offering for sin, so that he could say, Father, I have glorified thee on earth, I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. John 17, verse 4 He went through all the parts of his active and passive obedience, cheerfully and faithfully. Number 2 The Father made good his engagements to Christ all along, with no less faithfulness than Christ did his. He promised to assist and hold his hand. Isaiah 42, verse 5 And so he did. There appeared to him an angel from heaven strengthening him. Luke 22, verse 43 In his agony in the garden, this was seasonable aid and succor. He promised to accept him in his work, and that he should be glorious in his eyes. So he did. For he not only declared it by a voice from heaven, Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Luke 3, verse 22 But it was fully declared in his resurrection and ascension, which were a full discharge and justification of him. He promised him that he should see his seed. Isaiah 53, verse 10 And so he did. For his very birth's due was as the dew of the morning, and ever since his blood has been fruitful in the world. He promised gloriously to reward and exalt him, and so he hath, and that highly and superimimately, given him a name above every name in heaven and earth. Philippians 2, verses 9-11 Thus were the articles performed. Roman numeral 6 When was this compact made between the Father and the Son? I answer it bears date from eternity. Before this world was, then were his delights in us, while as yet we had no existence, but only in the infinite mind and purpose of Christ, who had decreed this for us in Christ Jesus, as the apostle speaks. 2 Timothy 1, verse 9 What grace was that which was given us in Christ before the world began, but this grace of redemption, which was from everlasting, thus contrived and designed for us in the way which has been here opened? Then was the counsel or consolation of peace between them both, as some understand Zechariah 6, verse 13. Inference 1 We see the abundant security God has given his people for their salvation, and that not only in respect of the covenant of grace made with them, but also of this covenant of redemption made with Christ for them, which is indeed the foundation of the covenant of grace. God's single promise is security enough to our faith, but his covenant of grace adds further security. Both these, viewed as the effects and fruits of this covenant of redemption, make all fast and sure. Happy were it if Christians, in perplexity and distress, would turn their eyes from the defects in their obedience to the fullness of Christ, and see themselves complete in him. 2 Moreover, hence we infer the validity and unquestionable success of Christ's intercession in heaven for believers. You read that he ever liveth to make intercession, Hebrews 7, 25, and that his blood speaks good things for them, Hebrews 12, 24. Now that his blood shall obtain what it pleads for in heaven is undoubted, and that from the consideration of this covenant of redemption. For here you see that the things he now asks of his Father are the very things which his Father promised him and covenanted to give him before this world was. So that besides the interest of the person, the very equity of the matter speaks with success and requires performance. Whatever he asks for us is as due to him as the wages of the hireling when the work is ended. If the work be done and done faithfully, as the Father hath acknowledged it is, then the reward is due, and due immediately. And no doubt would he shall receive it from the hands of a righteous God. 3 Hence in like manner you may be informed of the consistency of grace with full satisfaction to the justice of God. The apostle tells us we are saved according to his own purpose and grace which was given us in Jesus Christ before the world began. 2 Timothy 1, 9 That is, according to the gracious terms of this covenant of redemption. And yet you see notwithstanding how strictly God claims satisfaction from Christ. So then grace to us and satisfaction to justice are not so inconsistent as some adversaries of the truth would make them. What was debt to Christ is grace to us. Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Romans 3 verse 24 4 Hence judge of the antiquity of the love of God to believers. What an ancient friend he hath been to us, who loved us, provided for us, and contrived all our happiness before we were, yea, before the world was. We reap the fruits of this covenant now, the seed whereof was sown from eternity. Yea, it is not only ancient, but also most free. No excellence of ours could engage the love of God, for as yet we were not. 5 Hence judge how reasonable it is that believers should embrace the hardest terms of obedience unto Christ, who complied with such hard terms for their salvation. They were hard and difficult terms indeed on which Christ received you from the Father's hand. It was, as you have heard, to pour out his soul unto death. Though he was rich, yet for our sakes he became poor. 2 Corinthians 8 verse 9 Blush, ungrateful believers! O, let shame cover your faces! Judging yourselves now, hath Christ deserved that you should hesitate at trifles, that you should shrink at a few petty difficulties, and complain, This is hard, and that is severe? O, if you knew the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and this is wonderful condescension for you, you could not do it. 6 How greatly are we all concerned to make it sure to ourselves that we are of this number which the Father and the Son agreed for before the world was, that we were comprehended in Christ's engagement and contact with the Father. But some one will say, Who can know that? I answer you may know it without ascending into heaven or prying into unrevealed secrets that your names were in that covenant. If one, you are believers indeed. For all such the Father then gave to Christ. The men that thou gavest me, for of them he spoke immediately before, they have believed that thou didst send me. John 17 verses 6 and 8 2 If ye savingly know God in Jesus Christ, such were given him by the Father. I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me. 6 By this they are discriminated from the rest. The world hath not known me, but these have known. 25 3 If ye are men of another world, they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 16 May it be said of you, as of dying men, that ye are not men for this world, that ye are crucified and dead to it. Galatians 6.14 That ye are strangers in it. Hebrews 11 verses 13 and 14 4 If ye keep Christ's word, thine they were, and thou gavest them thee, and they have kept thy word. John 17 verse 6 By keeping his word, understand the receiving of the word in its sanctifying effects and influences into your heart and your perseverance in the profession and practice of it to the end. Sanctify them through thy truth, thy word is truth. Verse 17 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will. John 15 verse 7 Blessed and happy is that soul upon which these blessed characters appear, which our Lord Jesus has laid so close together within the compass of a few verses in the 17th chapter of John. These are the persons the Father delivered unto Christ, and Christ accepted from the Father in this blessed covenant. Chapter 4, page 41 The admirable love of God in giving his own Son for us. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son. John 3.16 In these words are to be considered 1. The original spring or fountain of our best mercy, the love of God. 2. The mercy flowing out of this fountain and that is Christ, the mercy as he is emphatically called. Luke 1 verse 72 The moral, kernel, and substance of all other mercies he gave his only begotten Son. 3. The objects of this love are the persons for whom the eternal Lord delivered Christ, namely the world. This must respect the elect of God in the world, such as do or shall actually believe as it is exegetically expressed in the next words, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish. Those whom he calls the world in that, he styles believers in this expression. These are the objects of his love. It is not angels but men that were so loved. 4. The manner in which this never enough celebrated mercy flows to us from the fountain of divine love and that is most freely and spontaneously. He gave, not he sold or barely parted with, but gave. Nor yet doth the Father's giving imply Christ to be merely passive, for as the Father is here said to give him, though the Apostle tells us that he gave himself. Who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2.20 The Father gave him out of good will to men and he as willingly bestowed himself on that service. Hence we learn that the gift of Christ is the highest and fullest manifestation of the love of God to sinners ever made from eternity. How is this gift of God to sinners signalized in that sentence of the Apostle herein is love. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. 1 John 4.10 Why doth the Apostle so magnify this gift in saying herein is love, as if there were love in nothing else? May we not say that to have a being, a being among rational creatures, therein is love. To have our life carried so many years, like a paper in the hand of providence, through so many dangers and not yet put out in obscurity, therein is love. To have food and raiment convenient for us, beds to lie on, relations to comfort us, in all these is love. Yea, but in all these there is no love in comparison with the love in sending or giving Christ for us. These are great mercies in themselves, but compared to this mercy, they are swallowed up as the light of candles when brought out to the sun. No, herein is love that God gave Christ for us. When the Apostle would show Romans 5.8, what is the noblest fruit that most commends to men the root of divine love that bears it, he shows us this very fruit of it. God commended his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. That is the very essence of that love. In expounding this precious point we shall show Roman numeral 1 how Jesus Christ was given by the Father and what is implied therein. Number 1 His designation and appointment unto death for us for you read that it was done according to the determinate counsel of God Acts 2.23 As the lamb under the law was separated from the flock and set apart for a sacrifice and though still living was intentionally and preparatively given and consecrated to the Lord so Jesus Christ was by the counsel and purpose of God thus chosen and set apart for his service and therefore in Isaiah 42.1 God calls him his elect or chosen one. Number 2 His giving Christ implies a parting with him or setting him as the French version has it at some distance from himself for a time. There was a kind of parting between the Father and the Son when he came to Tabernacle in our flesh. I came forth from the Father and then come into the world. Again I leave the world and go to the Father. John 16.28 This distance occasioned by his incarnation and humiliation was properly as to his humanity which was really distant from the glory into which it is now taken up and in withholding the manifestation of delight and love the Lord seemed to treat him as one at a distance from him. Oh this was it that so deeply pierced and wounded his soul as is evident from that complaint My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from the words of my roaring? Oh my God I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not, etc. Psalm 22 verses 1 and 2 Number 3 God's giving of Christ implies his delivering him into the hands of justice even as condemned persons are by sentence of law given or delivered into the hands of executioners So Acts 2 verse 23 Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God we have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain and so he is said to deliver him up to death for us all Romans 8 verse 32 Number 4 God's giving of Christ implies his application of him with all the purchase of his blood and settling all this upon us as an inheritance in portion My Father giveth you the true bread from heaven, for the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven and giveth life unto the world John 6 verse 32 and 33 God hath given him as bread to poor starving creatures that by faith they might eat and live and so he told the Samaritan woman, If thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that saith unto thee, Give me to drink thou wouldst have asked of him and he would have given me living water John 4 verse 10 Bread and water are the two necessary for the support of natural life. God hath given Christ you see to be all that and more to the spiritual life Roman numeral 2 This gift of Christ was the highest and fullest manifestation of the love of God that ever the world saw. Number 1 Consider how near and dear Jesus Christ was to the Father He was his son, his only son, the son of his love yea one with himself He expressed image of his person the brightness of his father's glory unto us a son is given Isaiah 9 6 and such a son as he calls his dear son Colossians 1 13 A late writer tells us that in the famine in Germany a poor family being ready to carry, the husband proposed to the wife to sell one of the children for bread to relieve themselves and the rest The wife at last consented it should be so but then they began to think of which of the four should be sold and when the eldest was named they both refused to part with that being their first born and the beginning of their strength Well when they came to the second they could not yield that he should be sold being the very picture and lively image of his father The third was named but that also was a child that best resembled the mother And when the youngest was thought of that was the Benjamin the child of their old age And so they determined rather to perish in the famine and part with the child for relief And you know how Jacob mourned when his Joseph and Benjamin were rent from him What is a child but a piece of the parent wrapped up in another's skin And yet our dearest children are but as strangers to us in comparison of the unspeakable dearness between the father and Christ Now that he should ever thus part with his son his only son is such a manifestation of love as will be admired to all eternity Number two Let it be considered to what he gave him even to death and that of the cross to be made a curse for us to be the scorn and contempt of men to the most unparalleled sufferings that ever were inflicted or borne by any It breaks our heart to behold our children struggling in the pangs of death But the Lord beheld his son struggling under agonies that never any felt before him He saw him falling to the ground groveling in the dust, sweating blood and amidst those agonies turning himself to his father and with a heart-rending cry, beseeching him Father, if it be possible let this cup pass Luke 22, 42 To wrath, to the wrath of an infinite God was Christ delivered and that by the hand of his own father Sure then that love must need want a name which made the father of mercy deliver his only son to such miseries for us Three It is a special consideration to enhance the love of God in giving Christ, that in giving him he gave the richest jewel in his cabinet, a mercy of the greatest worth and most inestimable value Heaven itself is not so valuable and precious as Christ is Whom have I in heaven but thee? Psalm 73, verse 25 O what a fair one what an only one what an excellent, lovely one is Christ Put the beauty of ten thousand paradises like the Garden of Eden into one Put all trees, all flowers, all smells, all colors, all tastes, all joys all sweetness, all loveliness in one O what a fair and excellent thing would that be And yet it should be less to that fair and dearest well-beloved Christ than one drop of rain to the whole sea, rivers, lakes and fountains of ten thousand earths Now for God to bestow the mercy of mercy, the most precious thing in heaven or earth upon poor sinners and as great, as lovely, as excellent as his son was, yet not to account him too good to bestow upon us what manner of love is best Number four Once more let it be considered on whom the Lord bestowed his son, on angels? No, but upon men Upon men, his friends? No, but upon his enemies This is love, and on this consideration the apostle lays a mighty weight God commended his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. When we were yet enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son Romans 5, verses 8-10 Who would part with a son for the sake of his dearest friends but God gave him and delivered him for enemies. O love unspeakable Number five Let us consider how freely this gift came from him. It was not wrested out of his hand by our importunity for we as little deserved as desired it. It was surprising self-moved eternal love that delivered him to us Not that we loved him but he first loved us. 1 John 4, 19 Thus as when you weigh a thing you cast in weight after weight till the scales turn so does God one consideration upon another to overcome our heart and make us admirably to cry, What manner of love is this? Thus I have showed you what God's giving of Christ is and what matchless love is manifested in this incomparable gift Inference 1 Learn hence the exceeding preciousness of souls and at what a high rate God values them that he gave his son, his only son out of his bosom, as a ransom for them. Surely this beats their preciousness all the world could not redeem them gold and silver could not be their ransom so speaks the apostle you were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold but with the precious blood of Christ 1 Peter 1, 18 Such an esteem God had for them that rather than they should perish Jesus Christ shall be made a man, yea, a curse for them. O then learn to put a due value upon your own souls. Do not sell that for which God hath paid so dear Remember what a treasure you carry about you. The glory that you see in this world is not equivalent in worth to it. What shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Matthew 16, 26 Number 2 If God hath given his own son for the world, then it follows that those for whom God gave his own son may warrantably expect any other temporal mercies from him This is the apostle's inference. He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Romans 8, 32 And so 1 Corinthians 3 verses 21-23 All things are yours for ye are Christ That is, they hold all other things in Christ who is the capital and most comprehensive mercy No other mercy you need or desire is or can be so dear to God as Jesus Christ As for the world and the comforts of it It is the dust of his feet He values it not, as you see by his providential disposals of it, having given it to the worst of men. All the Turkish empire, saith Luther, as great and glorious as it is is but a crumb which the master of the family throws to the dogs Think upon any other outward enjoyment that is valuable in your eyes, and there is not so much comparison between it and Christ in the esteem of God as between your dear children and the lumber of your houses in your esteem If then God has parted so freely with that which was infinitely dearer to him than these how shall he deny these when they may promote his glory and your good As Jesus Christ was nearer the heart of God than all these so Christ is in himself much greater and more excellent than all of them. Ten thousand worlds and the glory of them all is but the dust of the balance if weighed with Christ These things are but poor creatures but he is over all, God blessed forever. Romans 9 5 They are common gifts but he is the gift of God John 4 10 They are ordinary mercies but he is the mercy. Luke 1 72 As one pearl or precious stone is greater in value than ten thousand pebbles Now if God has so freely given the greater, how shall you suppose he should deny the lesser mercy Will a man give to another a large inheritance and dredge him a trifle? How can it be? There is no other mercy you need but you are entitled to it by the gift of Christ It is as to right conveyed to you with Christ So in the foresighted 1 Corinthians 3 21-23 The world is yours yea all is yours for you are Christ