01.03b MYSTICAL UNION between Christ and Believers2

9. A ninth benefit is SUPPORT. If you are a branch engrafted in Christ, the root supports you. The believer leans on Christ, as a weak woman in a journey leaning upon her beloved husband, Song of Solomon 8:5. He supports himself upon him, as a feeble old man stays himself on his staff, Isaiah 50:10. He rolls himself on him, as one rolls a burden he is not able to walk under, off his own back, upon another who is able to bear it, Psalms 22:8, marg. There are many weights to hang upon and press down the branches in Christ, the true vine. But you know, whatever weights hang on the branches, the stock bears all; it bears the branch, and the weight that is upon it too.

(1.) Christ supports believers in him, under a weight of outward troubles. That is a large promise, Isaiah 43:2, "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you: and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you." See how David was supported under a heavy load, 1 Samuel 30:6. His city Ziglag was burnt, his wives were taken captives, his men spoke of stoning him: nothing was left him but his God and his faith; but by his faith, he encouraged himself in his God. The Lord comes, and lays his cross on his people’s shoulders; it presses them down, and they are likely to sink under it, and therefore cry, "Master, save us, we perish!" But he supports them under their burden; he bears them up, and they bear their cross. Thus the Christian, with a weight of outward troubles upon him, goes lightly under his burden, having the everlasting arms underneath him. The Christian has a spring of comfort, which he cannot lose; and therefore never lacks something to support him.

If a man has all his riches in money, robbers may take these away; and then what more has he? But if the landed proprietor is robbed of his money—yet his lands remain for his support. Those who build their comfort on worldly goods, may quickly be comfortless; but those who are united to Christ shall find comfort, when all the streams of worldly enjoyments are dried up, Job 6:13, "Is not my help in me? and is wisdom driven quite from me?" That is, Though my substance is gone; though my servants, my children, my health, and soundness of body, are all gone; yet my grace is not gone! Though the Sabeans have driven away my oxen and donkeys, and the Chaldeans have driven away my camels; they have not driven away my faith, and my hope too: these are yet in me; they are not driven from me; so that by them I can fetch comfort from heaven, when I can have none from earth.

(2.) Christ supports his people under a weight of inward troubles and discouragements. Many times "heart and flesh fail them;" but then "God is the strength of their heart," Psalms 73:26. They may have a weight of guilt pressing them. This is a load that will make their backs bend, and their spirits sink: but he takes it off, and puts a pardon into their hand, while they cast their burden upon him. Christ takes the soul, as one marries a widow under a burden of debt: and so when the creditors come to Christ’s spouse, she carries them to her husband, confesses the debt, declares she is not able to pay—and lays all upon him. The Christian sometimes, through carelessness, losses his sense of pardon; he cannot find it, however he searches for it. The law takes that opportunity, and proceeds against him for a debt paid already. God hides his face, and the soul is distressed. Many arrows go through the heart now; many long accounts are laid before the man, which he reads and acknowledges. Often does he see the officers coming to apprehend him, and the prison door open to receive him. What else keeps him from sinking utterly under discouragements in this case—but the everlasting arms of a Mediator underneath him, and that he relies upon the great Surety.

Farther, they may have a weight of strong lusts pressing them. They have a body of death upon them. Death is a weight that presses the soul out of the body. A leg or an arm of death, if I may so speak, would be a terrible load. One lively lust will sometimes lie so heavy on a child of God, that he can no more remove it than a child could throw a giant from off him. How, then, are they supported under a whole body of death? Their support is from that root which bears them, from the everlasting arm that is underneath them. "His grace is sufficient for them," 2 Corinthians 12:9. The great stay of the believer is not the grace of God within him—that is a well whose streams sometimes run dry: but it is the grace of God without him—the grace that is in Jesus Christ; which is an ever-flowing fountain, to which the believer can never come amiss. For the apostle tells us in the same verse, it is "the power of Christ." "Most gladly therefore," says he, "will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me," or "tabernacle above me," as the cloud of glory did on the Israelites, which God spread for a covering, or shelter, to them in the wilderness, Psalms 105:39; compare Isaiah 4:5-6. So that the believer in this combat, like the eagle, first flies aloft by faith, and then comes down on the prey, Psalms 34:5, "They looked to him—and were lightened."

Finally, they have a weight of weakness and wants upon them—but they "cast over that burden on the Lord," their strength, "and he sustains them," Psalms 55:22. With all their wants and weakness they are cast upon him; as the poor, weak, and naked babe coming out of the womb, is cast into the lap of its tender and affectionate mother, Psalms 22:10. Though they be destitute, as a shrub in the wilderness, which the foot of every beast may tread down, the Lord will regard and support them, Psalms 102:17. It is not surprising that the weakest plant should be safe in a garden: but our Lord Jesus Christ is a hedge for protection to his weak and destitute ones, even in a wilderness.

OBJECTION. "But if the saints be so supported, how is it that they fall so often under temptation and discouragements?

ANSWER. (1.) However low they fall at any time—they never fall off; and that is a great matter. They "are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation," 1 Peter 1:5. Hypocrites may fall, so as to fall off, and fall into the pit, as a bucket falls into a well when the chain breaks. But, though the child of God may fall, and that so low that the waters go over his head—yet there is still a bond of union between Christ and him; the chain is not broken: he will not go to the ground; he will be drawn up again, Luke 22:31-32, "And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for you, that your faith fail not."

(2.) The falls of the saints flow from their not improving their union with Christ, their not making use of him by faith, for support or bearing them up, Psalms 27:13, "I had fainted, unless I had believed." While the nurse holds the child in her arms, it cannot fall to the ground; yet if the unwary child is not held by her, it may fall backwards in her arms, to its great hurt. Thus David’s fall broke his bones, Psalms 51:8; but it did not break the bond of union between Christ and him: the Holy Spirit, the bond of that union, was not taken from him, Psalms 51:11.

10. The last benefit I shall name, is, the special care of the Farmer, John 15:1-2, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the farmer. Every branch that bears fruit, he purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit." Believers, by virtue of their union with Christ, are the objects of God’s special care and providence. Mystical Christ is God’s vine; other societies in the world are but wild olive trees. The men of the world are but God’s out-field; the saints are his vineyard, which he has a special propriety in, and a special concern for, Song of Solomon 8:12, "My vineyard, which is mine, is before me." He who slumbers not nor sleeps, is the keeper of it; he does keep it: lest any hurt it, he will keep it night and day; he, in whose hand is the dew of heaven, will water it every moment, Isaiah 27:3. He dresses and weeds it, in order to further its fruitfulness, John 15:2. He cuts off the unfruitful twigs, that mar the fruitfulness of the branch. This is done especially by the word, and by crosses or afflictions; the saints need the ministry of the word, as much as the vineyard needs one to dress and prune the vines, 1 Corinthians 3:9, "We are laborers together with God; you are God’s husbandry, you are God’s building." And they need the cross too, 1 Peter 1:6.

Therefore, if we were to reckon the cross among the benefits flowing to believers from their union with Christ, I judge that we should not reckon amiss. Sure I am, in their sufferings they "suffer with him," Romans 8:17. The assurances which they have of the cross, have rather the nature of a promise, than of a threatening, Psalms 89:30-33, "If his children forsake my law - then will I visit their transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes. Nevertheless, my loving-kindness will I not utterly take from him, nor allow my faithfulness to fail." This looks like a tutor’s engaging to a dying father, to take care of the children left with him; and to give them both nurture and admonition for their good. The covenant of grace truly beats the spears of affliction into pruning-hooks, to them that are in Christ, Isaiah 28:9, "By this therefore shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged, and this is all the fruit to take away his sin."

Why, then, should we be angry with our cross? why should we be frightened at it? The believer must take up his cross, and follow his leader, the Lord Jesus Christ. He must take up his every-day’s cross, Luke 9:23, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily." Yes, he must take up holy day’s cross too, Lamentations 2:22, "You have called, as in a solemn day, my terrors round about." The church of the Jews had of a long time many a pleasant meeting at the temple, on solemn days, for the worship of God; but they got a solemnity of another nature, when God called together, about the temple and city, the Chaldean army, that burnt the temple, and laid Jerusalem in heaps. And as the church of God is yet militant in this lower region, how can it be but the clouds will return after the rain? But the cross of Christ, by which appellation the saint’s troubles are named, is a kindly name to the believer.

It is a cross indeed; not to the believer’s graces—but to his corruptions. The hypocrite’s seeming grace may indeed breathe out their last on a cross, as those of the stony-ground hearers did, Matthew 13:6, "When the sun" of persecution, ver. 21, "was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away;" but never did one of the real graces in a believer die upon the cross yet. Nay, as the candle shines brightest in the night, and the fire burns fiercest in intense frost; so the believers graces are commonly most vigorous in a time of trouble.

There is a certain pleasure and sweetness in the cross, to those who have their senses exercised to discern, and to find it out. There is a certain sweetness in a man’s seeing himself upon his trial for heaven, and standing candidate for glory. There is a pleasure in traveling over those mountains, where the Christian can see the prints of Christ’s own feet, and the footsteps of the flock, who have been there before him. How pleasant is it to a saint, in the exercise of grace, to see how a good God crosses his corrupt inclinations, and prevents his folly! How sweet is it to behold these thieves upon the cross! How refined a pleasure is there in observing how God draws away provision from unruly lusts, and so pinches them, that the Christian may get them governed! Truly, there is a paradise within this thorn-hedge.

Many a time the people of God are in bonds of sin; which are never loosed, until they are bound with cords of affliction. God takes them, and throws them into a fiery furnace—which burns off their bonds; and then, like the three children, Daniel 3:25, they are "free, walking in the midst of the fire." God gives his children a medicinal potion, with one bitter ingredient: if that will not work upon them, he will put in a second bitter ingredient, a third, and so on, as there is need, that they may work together for their good, Romans 8:28. With cross winds he hastens them to their labor. They are often found in such ways, as that the cross is the happiest thing that they can meet with: and well may they salute it as David did Abigail, saying, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me," 1 Samuel 25:32.

Worldly things are often such a load to the Christian, that he moves but very slowly heavenward. God sends a wind of trouble, which blows the burden off the man’s back; he then walks more speedily on his way, after God has removed some gilded earth from him, which was drawing his heart away from God, Zephaniah 3:12, "I will also leave in the midst of you an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord."

It was an observation of a heathen moralist, that "no history makes mention of any man, who has been made better by riches." I doubt whether our modern histories can supply the defect of ancient histories in this point. But sure I am, many have been the worse for riches: thousands have been hugged to death in the embraces of a smiling world; and many good men have got wounds from outward prosperity, that must be cured by the cross. I remember to have read of one, who having an internal abscess, had in vain used the help of physicians: but being wounded with a sword, the infection drained out; and his life was saved by that accident, which threatened immediate death. Often have spiritual abscesses gathered in the bosoms of God’s people, in time of outward prosperity, and been thus broken and drained by the cross. It is beneficial for believers to be healed by stripes; although they are usually so weak as to cry out for fear, at the sight of the pruning-knife, as if it were the destroying axe; and to think that the Lord is coming to kill them, when he is indeed coming to cure them.

I shall now CONCLUDE, addressing myself in a few words, first, to saints, and next to sinners. To you that are SAINTS, I say,

First, Strive to obtain and keep up sincere communion and fellowship with Jesus Christ; that is, to be still deriving fresh supplies of grace from the fountain which is in him, by faith: and making suitable returns of them, in the exercise of grace and holy obedience. Beware of estrangement between Christ and your souls. If it has gotten in already, which seems to be the case of many this day, endeavor to get it removed. There are multitudes in the world who slight Christ, though you should not slight him: many that looked fair for heaven, have turned their backs upon him. The warm sun of outward peace and prosperity has caused some to cast their cloak of religion from them, who held it fast when the wind of trouble was blowing upon them: and "Will you also go away?" John 6:67. The basest ingratitude is stamped on your slighting communion with Christ, Jeremiah 2:31, "Have I been a wilderness unto Israel, a land of darkness? Why do my people say—We are lords, we will come no more unto you?" Oh! beloved, "Is this your kindness to your friend?" It is unfitting for any wife to slight converse with her husband—but her especially if she was taken from a prison or a ash-heap, as you were, by your Lord. It is not a time for you to be out of your prayer chambers, Isaiah 26:20.

Those who now are walking most closely with God, may have enough to do to stand when the trial comes: how hard will it be for others then, who are likely to be surprised with troubles, when guilt is lying on their consciences unremoved! To be awakened out of a sound sleep, and cast into a raging sea, as Jonah was, will be a fearful trial. To feel trouble before we see it coming; to be past hope before we have any fear—is a very sad case. Therefore break down your idols of jealousy, mortify those lusts, those irregular appetites and desires, that have stolen away your hearts, and left you like Samson without his hair, and say, "I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now," Hosea 2:7.

Secondly, Walk as befits those who are united to Christ. Prove your union with him by "walking as he also walked," 1 John 2:6. If you are brought from under the power of darkness, let your light shine before men. "Shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life;" as the lantern holds the candle, which being in it, shines through it, Php 2:15-16. Now you who profess Christ to be in you, let his image shine forth in your life, and remember that the business of your lives is to prove, by practical arguments, what you profess.

1. You know the character of a wife: "She who is married, cares how she may please her husband." Go—and do likewise; "walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing," Colossians 1:10. This is the great business of life; you must please him, though it should displease all the world. What he hates must be hateful to you, because he hates it. Whatever lusts come to gain your hearts, deny them, seeing the grace of God has appeared, teaching us so to do, and you are joined to the Lord. Let him be a covering to your eyes; for you have not your choice to make, it is made already; and you must not dishonor your head. A man takes care of his feet, because, if he catches cold there, it flies up to his head. "Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid," says the apostle, 1 Corinthians 6:14. Will you take that heart of yours, which is Christ’s dwelling-place, and lodge his enemies there? Will you take that body, which is his temple, and defile it, by using the members thereof as instruments of sin?

2. Be careful to bring forth fruit, and much fruit. The branch well laden with fruit—is the glory of the vine, and of the farmer too, John 15:8, "Herein is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit; so shall you be my disciples." A barren tree stands safer in a forest, than in an orchard; and branches in Christ, which do not bring forth fruit, will be taken away, and cast into the fire.

3. Be heavenly-minded, and maintain a holy contempt of the world. You are united to Christ; he is your head and husband, and is in heaven: therefore your hearts should be there also; Colossians 3:1, "If you then are risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God." Let the serpent’s seed go on their belly, and eat the dust of this earth: but let the members of Christ be ashamed to bow down, and feed with them.

4. Live and act dependently, depending by faith on Jesus Christ. That which grows on its own root, is a tree, not a branch. It is of the nature of a branch, to depend on the stock for all, and to derive all its sap from thence. Depend on Jesus for life, light, strength, and all spiritual benefits, Galatians 2:20, "I live—yet not I—but Christ lives in me; and the life which I live now in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God." For this cause, in the mystical union, strength is united to weakness, that death and earth may mount up on borrowed wings. Depend on him for temporal benefits also; Matthew 6:11, "Give us this day our daily bread." If we have trusted him with our eternal concerns, let us be ashamed to distrust him in the matter of our provision in the world.

5. Be of a humble disposition, as being united to the meek Jesus. There is a prophecy to this purpose concerning the kingdom of Christ, Isaiah 11:6, "The wolf shall dwell with the lamb; and the leopard shall lie down with the lamb." It is an allusion to the beasts in Noah’s ark. The beasts of prey that were accustomed to kill and devour others, when once they came into the ark, lay down in peace with them: the lamb was in no hazard from the wolf there, nor the lamb from the leopard. There was a beautiful accomplishment of it in the primitive church, Acts 4:32, "And the multitude of those who believed, were of one heart and of one soul." And this prevails in all the members of Christ, according to the measure of the grace of God in them.

Man is born naked: he comes naked into this world, as if God designed him for the picture of peace; and surely, when he is born again, he comes not into the new world of grace with claws to tear, a sword to wound, and a fire in his hand to burn up his fellow-members in Christ, because they cannot see with his light. Oh! it is sad to see Christ’s lilies—as thorns in one another’s sides; Christ’s lambs devouring one another like lions, and God’s diamonds cutting one another: yet it must be remembered, that sin is no proper cement for the members of Christ, though Herod and Pontius Pilate may be made friends that way. The apostle’s rule is plain, Hebrews 12:14, "Follow peace with all men, and holiness." To follow peace no farther than our inclinations, credit, and such like things will allow us, is too short: to pursue it farther than holiness allows us, that is, conformity to the Divine will, is too far.

Peace is precious—yet it may be bought too dearly: therefore we must rather lack it—than purchase it at any expense of truth or holiness. But otherwise it cannot be bought too dearly; and it will always be precious in the eyes of the sons of peace. And now, SINNERS, what shall I say to you? I have given you some view of the privileges of those in the state of grace. You have seen them afar off; but alas! they are not yours, because you are not Christ’s. The sinfulness of an unregenerate state is yours; and the misery of it is yours also: you have neither part nor lot in this matter. The guilt of all your sins lies upon you; you have no part in the righteousness of Christ. There is no peace to you, no peace with God, no true peace of conscience; for you have no saving interest in the great peace-maker. You are none of God’s family; the adoption we spoke of, belongs not to you. You have no part in the Spirit of sanctification; and, in one word, you have no inheritance among those who are sanctified. All I can say to you in this matter, is, that the case is not desperate; these choice blessings may yet be yours, Revelation 3:20, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hears my voice, and opens the door, I will come into him, and will sup with him, and he with me." Heaven is proposing a union with earth still! The potter is making suit to his own clay! The gates of the city of refuge are not yet closed! O, that we could compel you to come in!

Thus far of the state of grace.