1 Peter 2:24

Who his own self bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we being dead to sin, should live to righteousness; by whose stripes you were healed.

That which is deepest in the heart, is readily most in the mouth. That which abounds within, runs over most by the tongue or pen, when men light upon the speaking of that subject, that possesses the affection, they can hardly be taken off, or drawn from it again. Thus the Apostles in their writings, when they make mention any way of Christ suffering for us, they love to dwell on it, as that which they take most delight to speak of: such delicacy and sweetness is in it to a spiritual taste, that they like to keep it in their mouth, and are never out of their theme when they insist on Jesus Christ, though they have but named him by occasion of some other doctrine, for he is the great subject of all they have to say.

Thus here, the Apostle had spoken of Christ in the foregoing words very fitly to this present subject, setting him before Christian servants and all suffering Christians, as their complete example, both in point of much suffering, and of perfect innocency, and patience in suffering. And expressed their engagement to study and follow that example; yet he cannot leave it so, but having said, that all those his sufferings wherein he was so exemplary, were for us, as a chief consideration, for which we should study to be like him, he returns to that again, and enlarges himself in it in words partly the same, partly very near those of that evangelist among the prophets Isaiah Chapter 53.

And it suits very well with his main scope, to press this point; as giving both very much strength and sweetness to the exhortation, as being most reasonable, that we willingly conform to him in suffering that had never been an example of suffering, nor subject at all to sufferings nor capable of them but for us; and most comfortable in the light sufferings of this moment, to consider, that he has freed us from the sufferings of eternity, by suffering himself in our stead, in the fullness of time.

That Jesus Christ is in doing and suffering, our supreme and matchless example, and that he came to be so, is a truth, but that he is nothing further and came for no other end, is (you see) a high point of falsehood; for how should man be enabled to learn, and follow that example of obedience unless there were more in Christ, and what would become of that great reckoning of disobedience that man stands guilty of. No, these are too narrow, he came to bear our sins on his own body on the tree, and for this purpose had a body fitted for him, and given him to bear this burden, to do this, as the will of his Father, to stand for us in stead of all offerings, and sacrifices; and by that will, says the Apostle, we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

This was his business, not only to rectify sinful mankind by his example; but to redeem him by his blood, he was a teacher come from God. As a Prophet he teaches us the way of life, and as the best and greatest of prophets is perfectly like his doctrine, and his actions (that in all teachers is the liveliest part of doctrine) his carriage in life and death, is our great pattern and instruction: but what is said of his forerunner, is more eminently true of Christ, he is a Prophet and more than a Prophet, a Priest satisfying justice for us, and a King conquering sin and death for us, an example in deed, but more than an example, our sacrifice, and our life, and all in all, it is our duty to walk as he walked, to make him the pattern of our steps (1 John 2:6). But our comfort and salvation lies in this, that he is the propitiation for our sins, verse 2. So in the first chapter of that epistle verse 7, we are to walk in the light, as he is in the light: for all our walking we have need of that which follows, that bears the great weight, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin, and so still that glory which he possesses in his own person, is the pledge of ours, he is there for us. He lives to make intercession for us, says the Apostle, and I go to prepare a place for you, says he himself.

We have in the words these two great points, and in the same order as the words lie. 1. The nature, and quality of the sufferings of Jesus Christ, and 2. The end of them.

In the expression of his suffering, we are to consider. 1. The commutation of the persons, he himself, for us. 2. The work undertaken and performed, he bore our sins in his own body on the tree.

1. The act, or sentence of the law against the breach of it standing in force, and divine justice expecting satisfaction, death was the necessary and inseparable consequent of sin. If you say the supreme majesty of God being accountable to none, might have forgiven all without satisfaction, we are not to contest that, nor foolishly to offer to sound the bottomless deep of his absolute prerogative, Christ implies in his prayer, that it was impossible that he could escape that cup: but the impossibility is resolved into his Father's will, as the cause of it. But this we may clearly see following the tract of the holy Scriptures (our only safe way) that this way wherein our salvation is contrived is most excellent, and suitable to the greatness, and goodness of God, so full of wonders of wisdom, and love, that the angels, as our Apostle tells us before, cannot forbear looking on it, and admiring it; for all their exact knowledge, yet they still find it infinitely beyond their knowledge, still in astonishment and admiration of what they see, and still in search looking in to see more. Those Cherubim still having their eyes fixed on this mercy seat.

Justice might indeed have seized on rebellious man, and laid the pronounced punishment on him, mercy might have freely acquitted him, and pardoned all: but can we name any place where mercy and justice as relating to condemned man could have met and shined jointly in full aspect, save only in Jesus Christ, in whom indeed mercy and truth met, and righteousness and peace kissed each other. Yes, in whose person the parties concerned, that were at so great a distance met so near, as nearer, cannot be imagined.

And not only was this the only way, for the consistency of these two, justice and mercy, but take each of them severally, and they could not have been in so full luster, as in this. God's just hatred of sin did out of doubt appear more in punishing his own only begotten Son for it, than if the whole race of mankind had suffered for it eternally. Again it raises the notion of mercy to the highest, that sin is not only forgiven us, but for this end God's own coeternal Son is given to us, and for us. Consider what he is, and what we are, he the Son of his love, and we enemies. Therefore it is emphatically expressed in the words, he himself bore our sins. God so loved the world, but love amounts to this much, that it was so great, as to give his Son: but how great that is, cannot be uttered. In this, says the Apostle, God commends his love to us, sets it up to the highest, gives us the richest and strongest evidence of it.

The foundation of this frame, this appearing of Christ for us, and undergoing and answering all in our stead, lies in the decree of God, where it was plotted and contrived in the whole way of it from eternity, and the Father and the Son being one, and their thoughts and will one, they were perfectly agreed on it, and those likewise for whom it should hold, were agreed upon, and their names written up, according to which they are said to be given to Christ to redeem. And just according to that model did all the work proceed, and was accomplished in all points, perfectly answering to the pattern of it in the mind of God. As it was preconcluded there, that the Son should undertake the business, this matchless piece of service, for his Father, and that by his interposing men should be reconciled and saved, so that he might be altogether a fit person for the work, it was resolved, that as he was already fit for it by the almightiness of his deity and Godhead, and the acceptableness of his person to the Father, as the Son of God, so he should be further fitted by uniting wonderfully, weakness to almightiness, the frailty of man to the power of God, because that suffering for man was a main point of the work, so as his being the Son of God made him acceptable to God, his being the Son of Man made him suitable to man, in whose business he had engaged himself, and to the business itself to be performed; and not only was there in him, by his human nature a conformity with man (for that might have been by a new created body) but a consanguinity with man, by a body framed of the same piece, a Redeemer, a kinsman as the Hebrew word is — only purified for his use, as was needful, and framed after a peculiar manner in the womb of a Virgin, as it is Hebrews 10. You have fitted a body for me, having no sin itself, because ordained to have so much of our sins as it is here, he bore them on his own body.

And this looks back to the primitive transaction and purpose, Lo I come to do your will, says the Son, and behold my servant whom I have chosen, says the Father, this masterpiece of my works, none in heaven or earth fit to serve me in it, but my own Son, and as he came into the world according to that decree and will; so he goes out of it again, in that way, the Son of Man goes as is determined, it was wickedly and maliciously done by men against him, but determined (which is that he there speaks of) wisely and graciously by his Father, with his own consent. As in those two-faced pictures, look upon the crucifying of Christ one way, as plotted by a treacherous disciple, and malicious priests, and rulers, and nothing more deformed and hateful than the authors of it; but view it again, as determined in God's counsel, for the restoring of lost mankind, and so it is full of unspeakable beauty and sweetness, infinite wisdom and love, in every tract of it.

Thus to the persons for whom, as their coming to him reflects upon that first donation, as flowing from that, all that the Father has given me shall come to me (John 6).

Now this being God's great design; that he would have men eye and consider more than all the rest of his works, (and yet is least of all considered by the most) the other covenant made with the first Adam was but to make way, and so to speak, to make work for this; for he knew that it would not hold, therefore as this new covenant became needful by the breach of the other, so the failing of that other sets off and commends the firmness of this, the former was with a man in his best condition, and yet he kept it not, even then he proved vanity, as it is [reconstructed: Psalm 39] so that the second to be stronger, is made with a man indeed, to supply the former; but he is God-man to be surer than the former, and therefore it holds; and this is the difference as the Apostle expresses it, that the first Adam, in that first covenant, was laid as a foundation, and though we say not that the Church in its true notion was built on him, yet the estate of the whole race of mankind, the materials that the Church is built of, lay on him for that time, and it failed. But upon this Rock the second Adam, is the Church so firmly built, that the gates of Hell cannot prevail against [illegible]. The first Adam was made a quickening, or life-giving Spirit. The first had light but he transferred it not, yea, he kept it not, for himself drew in, and transferred death, but the second by death, conveys life to all that are reckoned his seed. He bore their [illegible].

He bore them on the tree in that outside of his suffering, the visible kind of death inflicted on him that it was hanging on the tree of the Cross; there was an analogy with the end, and main work, and was ordered by the Lord with regard to that, being a death declared accursed by the law, as the Apostle Saint Paul observes, and so declaring him that was God blessed for ever to have been made a curse, that is accounted as accursed for us, that we might be blessed in him, in whom according to the promise, all the nations of the earth are blessed.

But that wherein lay the strength, and main stress of his sufferings, was this invisible weight that none could see that gazed on him, but he felt more than all. In this there are three things. 1. The weight of sin. 2. The transferring of it upon Christ. 3. His bearing of it.

1. He bore as a heavy burden; so the word of bearing in general, and those two words particularly used by the Prophet to which these allude, are the bearing of some great mass or load, and thus sin is, for it has the wrath of an offended God hanging at it, indissolubly tied to it, which who can bear the least of it, and therefore the least sin, being the procuring cause of it, will press a man down forever, that he shall not be able to rise. Who can stand before you when once you are angry, says the Psalmist, and the Prophet Jeremiah 3: Return, backsliding Israel, and I will not cause my wrath to fall upon you — fall as a great weight, or as a millstone, crushes the soul.

But senseless we, go light under the burden of sin, and feel it not, complain not of it, therefore truly said to be dead in it, otherwise it could not but press us, and press out complaints. O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me? A profane, secure sinner thinks it nothing to break the holy law of God, to please his flesh, or the world, counts sin a light matter, makes a mock of it as Solomon says, but a stirring conscience is of another mind. Mine iniquities are gone over my head, etc. (Psalm 38:4).

Sin is such a burden as makes the very frame of heaven and earth that is not guilty of it — indeed, the whole creation — to crack and groan (it is the Apostle's doctrine, Romans 8), and yet the impenitent heart whose guiltiness it is, not moved, groans not; for your accustomed groaning is no such matter.

Indeed, to consider in the present subject where we may best read what it is, it was a heavy load to Jesus Christ (Psalm 40), where the Psalmist speaks in the person of Christ he complains heavily: innumerable evils have compassed me about, mine iniquities — not his, as done by him, but yet his, by reckoning to pay for them — they have taken hold of me, so that I am not able to look up, they are more than the hairs of my head, therefore my heart fails me. And surely that which pressed him so sore, that upholds heaven and earth, no other in heaven or in earth could have sustained and surmounted, but would have sunk and perished under it. Was it (think you) the pain of that common outside of his death, though very painful, that drew such a word from him, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Or was it the fear of it beforehand that pressed a sweat of blood from him? No, it was this burden of sin, the first of which was committed in the Garden, that then began to be laid upon him and fastened on his shoulders in the Garden, ten thousand times heavier than the cross, which he was caused to bear, that might be awhile turned over to another; but this could not. This was the cup he so trembled at, that gall and vinegar after, to be offered him by his crucifiers, or any other part of his external sufferings. It was the bitter cup of wrath due to sin that his Father put into his hand, and caused him drink — the very same thing that is here called the bearing our sins on his body.

And consider, that the very smallest sins went in to make up this load, and made it so much the heavier, and therefore though sins be comparatively lesser and greater, yet learn from that to account no sin in itself small, that offends the great God, and lay heavy upon your great Redeemer in the day of his sufferings.

At his apprehending, besides the soldiers, that invisible crowd of the sins he was to suffer for came about him, for it was they that laid strongest hold on him — he could easily have shaken off all the rest, as appears: but our sins laid the arrest on him, being accounted his, as it is in that aforementioned place (Psalm 40). Now among these were even those sins we call small; they were of the number that took him, and they were among those instruments of his bloodshed: if the greater were as the spear that pierced his side, the less were as the nails that pierced his hands and his feet, and the very least, as the thorns that were set on his precious head. And the multitude of them made up what was wanting in their magnitude, though they were small they were many.

They were transferred upon him by virtue of that covenant we spoke of, they became his debt, and he responsible for all they came to. Seeing you have accepted of this business according to my will (may we conceive the Father saying to his Son) you must go through with it, you are engaged in it; but it is no other, than what you understood perfectly before, you knew what it would cost you, and yet out of joint love with me to those I named to be saved by you, you were as willing as I, to the whole undertaking, now therefore the time is come, that I must lay upon you the sins of all those persons, and you must bear them, the sins of all those believers that lived before, and all that are to come after to the end of the world. The Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all, says the prophet, took it off from us, and charged it on him, made it to meet on him, or to fall in together as the word is, the sins of all, in all ages before, and after, that were to be saved, all their guiltiness reencountered, and met together on his back, upon the Cross, and whoever of all that number had least sin, yet had no small burden to cast on him; and to give accession to the whole weight. Every man has had his own way of wandering; as the prophet there expresses it, and he paid for all; all fell on him: and as in testimony of his meekness and patience, so in this regard likewise, was he so silent in his sufferings; in regard that though his enemies dealt most unjustly with him: yet, he stood as convicted before the judgment seat of his Father, under the imputed guilt of all our sins, and so eyeing him, and accounting his business chiefly with him, he did patiently bear the due punishment of all our sins at his Father's hand, and suited that of the Psalmist. I was as dumb and opened not my mouth, because you did [reconstructed: it]. Therefore the prophet immediately subjoins, that of his silent carriage (Isaiah 53), to that which he had spoken of, the confluence of our iniquities upon him.

And if this our sins were accounted his, then in the same way, and for that very reason of necessity, his sufferings, and satisfaction must be accounted ours, as he said for his disciples to the men that came to take him, if it be me you seek, then let these go free: so he said for all believers to his Father, his wrath then seizing on him, if on me you will lay hold, then let these go free. And thus the agreement was (2 Corinthians 5, final verse).

So then, there is a union between believers and Jesus Christ, by which this interchange is made, he charged with their sins, and they clothed with his satisfaction, and righteousness, and that union is first in God's decree of election running this way, that they should live in Christ, and so choosing the head, and the whole mystical body as one, and reckoning their debt as his in his purpose, that he might receive satisfaction, and they salvation in their head Christ: the execution of that purpose and union begun in Christ's incarnation, being for them, though the nature be more common, he is said not to take on the angels, but the seed of Abraham, the company of believers, he became man for their sakes, because they are men: that he is of the same nature with unbelieving men that perish, is but by accident, as it were, there is no good to them in that, but the great evil of deeper condemnation if they hear of him, and believe not, but he was made man to be like, indeed, to be one with the elect, and he is not ashamed to call them brothers, as the Apostle there says. 2. Then in the actual intention of the Son so made man; he presenting himself to the Father in all he did, and suffered as for them, having them, and them only in his eye and thoughts in all: For their sakes do I sanctify myself (John 17:19). 3. The union is applied and performed in them, when they are converted and engrafted into Jesus Christ by faith and this does actually discharge them of their own sins, and entitle them to his righteousness, and so justifies them in the sight of God. 4. The consummation of this union is in glory, which is the result and fruit of all the former, as it began in Heaven it is completed there; but between these two in Heaven, the intervention of those other two degrees of it on earth were necessary, being intended in the first, as tending to the attainment of the last, these steps we have distinctly in his own prayer (John 17). First, verse 2: God's purpose that the Son should give eternal life to those he has given him. 2. Verse 4: I have finished the work. 3. Verses 6 and 8, and often after, their faith, their believing and keeping the word, and then the last, verse 24: I will that they whom you have given me be with me where I am. There meets the first donation and the last.

Now to obtain this life for them he died in their stead, appeared as the high priest, being perfectly, and truly what the name was on their plate of gold: holiness to the Lord (Exodus 28:36). And so bearing their iniquity, as it is added there of the priest, verse 38. But because he was not the Redeemer, but a perfect figure of him, he did not himself suffer for the people's sin, but turned it over upon the beasts, that he sacrificed, signifying that translation of sin, by laying his hand upon the head of the beast: but Jesus Christ is both the great high priest, and the great sacrifice in one, and this seems to be here implied in these words, himself etc. On his own body he bore etc., which the legal priests did not, so (Hebrews 9:12). He made his soul an offering for sin (Isaiah 53), and (Hebrews 9) he offered up himself, his whole self, and in the history of the Gospel his soul was heavy, and chiefly suffered; but the bearing on his body, and offering it that is oftenest mentioned as the visible part of the sacrifice, and in his way of offering it, not excluding the other. Thus (Romans 12:1) we are exhorted to give our bodies in opposition to the bodies of beasts, and called a living sacrifice, which they are not without the soul, so his bearing on his body imports the bearing it on his soul too.

3. His bearing that hints that he was active, and willing in his suffering for us; not a constrained offering: He laid down his life, as he tells us, and this here, He bore, is, he took willingly off, lifted from us that burden to bear it himself. It was counted an ill sign among the heathens, when the beasts went unwillingly to be sacrificed, and drew back; and [reconstructed: good], when they went willingly: But never sacrifice so willing, as our great sacrifice was, and we may be assured, he has appeased his Father's wrath, and wrought atonement for us. Isaac in this, his type — we hear of no reluctance, but quietly bound, when he was to be offered up. There be two words in Isaiah, the one bearing, the other [reconstructed: taking] away, this is also that taking away the sins of the world in St. John (1:29). Which answers to both, and so he, to both the goats (Leviticus 16). He did bear our sins on his cross, and from there to his grave, and there they are buried; and they whose sins he did so bear, and take away, and bury, they shall hear no more of them as theirs to bear. Is he not then worthy to behold, in that notion that John took him and designed him by: Behold the Lamb of God that bears and takes away the sins of the world.

You then that are gazing on vanity, be persuaded to turn your eyes this way, and behold this lasting wonder, this Lord of Life dying; but the most, alas! want a due eye for this object; 'tis the eye of faith alone, that looks aright on him, and is daily discovering new worlds of excellency and delight in this crucified Saviour, that can view him daily, as hanging on the cross without the childish gaudy help of a crucifix, and grow in the knowledge of that love, that passes knowledge, and rejoice itself in frequent thinking and speaking of him, in stead of these idle and vain thoughts at the best, and empty discourses, wherein the most delight, and wear out the day. What is all knowledge but painted folly in comparison of this? Though you had Solomon's faculty to discourse of all plants, and have not the right knowledge of this root of [reconstructed: Jesse]: If you were singular in the knowledge of the stars, and course of the heavens, and could walk through the spheres with a Jacob's staff; but ignorant of this star of Jacob: If you knew the [reconstructed: histories] of all time, and the life and death, of all the most famous princes, and could rehearse them all; but do not spiritually know and apply to yourself the death of Jesus, as your life, you are still a wretched fool for them, and all your knowledge with you shall quickly perish. On the other side, if your capacity or breeding has denied you the knowledge of all these things, wherein men glory so much; yet do but learn Christ crucified, and what would you have more? That shall make you happy for ever, for this is life eternal to know you, &c.

Here St. Paul sets up his rest, I determined to know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified. Whatever I knew besides, I resolved to be, as if I knew nothing besides this, the only knowledge wherein I will rejoice myself, and which I will labor to impart to others.

I have tried and compared the rest, and find them all unworthy of their room beside this, and my whole soul too little for this, and have passed this judgment and sentence on all. I have adjudged myself to deny all other knowledge, and confined myself within this circle, and I am not constrained, so there's room enough in it, 'tis larger than heaven and earth, and him crucified, the most despised and ignominious part, yet the sweetest and most comfortable part of all, the root, from where all our hopes of life and spiritual joys do spring.

But the most part hear this subject as a story, some a little moved with the present sound of it, but draw it not home into their hearts, to make it theirs, and find salvation in it, but still cleave to sin, and love sin better than him that suffered for it.

But you whose hearts the Lord has deeply humbled in the sense of sin, come to this depth of consolation, and try it, that you may have experience of the sweetness and [reconstructed: riches] of it, study this point thoroughly, and you will find it answer all, and quiet your consciences. Apply this bearing of sin by the Lord Jesus for you, for it is published, and made known to you for this purpose, this is the genuine and true use of it, as of the brazen serpent, not [reconstructed: merely] to gaze on the fabric of it, but to cure those that looked on it: when all that can be said, is said against you, it's true may you say, but it is satisfied for, he on whom I rest made it his, and did bear it for me. The person of Christ of more worth than all men, yes than all the creatures, and therefore his life a full ransom for the greatest offender.

And for outward troubles, and sufferings which were the occasion of this doctrine in this place, they are all made exceeding light by the removal of this great pressure. Let the Lord lay on me what he will, seeing he has taken off my sin, and laid that on his own Son in my stead, I may suffer many things, but he has [reconstructed: borne] that for me, which alone was able to make me miserable.

And you that have this persuasion, how will your hearts be taken up with his love? Who thus loved you, as to give himself for you, and by interposing himself to bear off from you the stroke of everlasting death, and that encountered all the wrath due to us, and went through: with that great work by reason of his unspeakable love, Let him never go forth from my heart who for my sake refused to go down from the cross. That we being dead to sin, should live to righteousness.

The Lord does nothing in vain, has not made the least of his work to no purpose, in wisdom has he made them all, says the Psalmist, and that is not only in regard of their excellent frame and order, but of their end, which is a chief point of wisdom; so then to the right knowledge of this great work put into the hands of Jesus Christ, it is of special concern to understand, what is this end.

This is the thing that his wisdom and love aimed at in that great undertaking, and therefore will be our truest wisdom, and the truest evidence of our reflex love to intend the same thing, that in this the same mind may be in us that was in Christ Jesus in his suffering for us, and for this very end is it expressed.

In this there are 3 things: first, what this death and life is; 2, the intendment of it in the sufferings and death of Jesus Christ; 3, the effecting of it by them.

Whatever this is, sure it is no small change, that bears the name of the great and last natural change that we are subject to, a death, and then another kind of life succeeding to it, and in this the greatest part are mistaken, that they take any light alteration in themselves for true conversion.

There be a world deluded with superficial moral changes in their life, some rectifying of their outward actions, and course of life, and somewhat too in the temper and habitude of their mind, far from reaching the bottom of nature's wickedness, and laying the axe to the root of the tree, it is such a work as men can make a shift withal by themselves, but the renovation that the Spirit of God works is like himself, so deep, and through a work, that it is justly called by the name of the most substantial works, and productions a new birth, and more than that, a new creation, and here a death and a kind of life following it.

This death to sin, supposes a former living in it, and to it, and while a man is so, he is said indeed, to be dead in sin, and yet withal this is true, that he lives in sin, as the Apostle joins the expressions, speaking of widows, she that lives in pleasures, is dead while she lives. So (Ephesians 2), dead in trespasses and sins, and he adds, wherein you walked, which imports a life, such a one as it is, and more expressly (verse 3), we had our conversation in the lusts of our flesh. Now thus to live in sin, is called to be dead in it, because in that condition man is indeed dead in respect of that divine life of the soul, that happy being which it should have in union with God, for which it was made, and without which it had better not be at all: for that life as it is different from its natural being, and a kind of life above it, so it is contrary to that corrupt being, and life it has in sin; and therefore, to live in sin, is to be dead in it, being a deprivement of that divine being, that life of the soul in God, in comparison of which, not only the base life it has in sin, but the very natural life it has in the body, and the body by it, is not worthy the name of life. You see the body when the thread of its union with the soul is cut, becomes not only straightway a motionless lump; but within a little time a putrefied noisome carcass, and thus the soul by sin, is cut off from God, who is its life, as is the soul of the body, it has not only no moving faculty in good, but fills full of rottenness and vileness as the word is (Psalm 14): they are gone aside and become filthy. The soul by turning away from God turns filthy, yet as a man thus spiritually dead lives naturally, so because he acts and spends that natural life in the ways of sin, he is said to live in sin; indeed, there is somewhat more in that expression, than the mere passing of his life in that way, for instead of that happy life his soul should have in God, he pleases himself in the miserable life of sin, that which is his death, as if it were the proper life of his soul — that natural propension he has to sin, and the continual delight he takes in it, as in his element, and living to it, as if that were the very end of his being. In that estate his body nor his mind stirs not without sin, setting aside his manifest breaches of the law, those actions that are evidently and totally sinful, his natural actions, his eating, and drinking; his religious actions, his praying, and hearing, and preaching are sin at the bottom and generally his heart is no other, but a forge of sin, every imagination, every fiction of things framed there, is only evil continually, or every day, and all the day long, it is his very trade and life.

Now in opposition to this life of sin, living in it, and to it, a Christian is said to die to sin, to be cut off or separated from it. In our miserable natural estate there is as close a union between us, and sin, as between our souls and bodies, it lives in us, and we in it, and the longer we live in that condition the more the union grows, and the harder it is to dissolve it, and it is as old as the union of soul and body begun with it; so that nothing but that death here spoken of can part them: and this death, in this relative sense is mutual, in the work of conversion sin dies, and the soul dies to sin, and these two are really one and the same, the Spirit of God kills both at one blow, sin in the soul, and the soul to sin, as the Apostle says of the world, both are killed the one to the other.

And there are in it chiefly these two things that make the difference: 1, the solidness; and 2, the universality of this change under this notion of death.

Many things may lie in a man's way between him and the acting of various sins, which possibly he affects most, some restraints outward, or inward may be upon him, the authority of others, or the fear of shame, or punishment, or the check of an enlightened conscience, and though by reason of these, he commits not the sin he would, yet he lives in it, because he loves it, because he would commit it, as we say, the soul lives not so much where it animates, as where it loves. And generally that kind of metaphorical life, by which a man is said to live in any thing, has its principal seat in the affection — that is the immediate link of the union in such a life, and the untying and death consists chiefly in the disengagement of the heart, breaking off the affection from it. You that love the Lord hate evil. An unrenewed mind may have some temporary dislikes even of its beloved sins in cold blood, but it returns to like them within a while. A man may not only have times of cessation from his habitual way of sinning, but by reason of the society wherein he is, and withdrawing of occasions to sin, and various other causes, his very desire after it may seem to him to be abated, and yet he not dead to sin, but only asleep to it, and therefore when a temptation backed with opportunity, and other inducing circumstances comes and jogs him, he awakes, and arises and follows it.

A man may for a while distaste some meat that he loves (possibly upon a surfeit) but he regains quickly his liking of it: every quarrel with sin, and fit of dislike of it, is not this hatred. Upon the lively representing the deformity of his sin to his mind, certainly a natural man may fall out with it, but these are but as the little jars of husband and wife, that are far from dissolving the marriage, it is not a fixed hatred, such as among the Jews inferred a divorce, if you hate her put her away, and that is to die to it, as by a legal divorce the husband and wife are civilly dead one to another in regard of the tie and use of marriage.

Again, some men's education and custom, and moral principles may free them from the grossest kind of sins, indeed, a man's temper may be averse from them, but they are alive to their own kind of sins; such as possibly are not so deformed in the common account, covetousness, or pride, or hardness of heart, and either a hatred or disdain of the ways of Holiness that are too strict for them, and exceed their size. Besides, for the good of human society, and for the interest of his own church and people, God restrains many natural men from the height of wickedness, and gives them moral virtues. There be very many, and very common sins that more refined natures, it may be, are scarce tempted to, but as in their diet and apparel, and other things in their natural life, they have the same kind of being with other persons, though more neat and pleasant, so in this living to sin — they live the same life with other ungodly men, though in a little more delicate way.

They consider not, that the devils are not in themselves subject to, nor capable of many of those sins, that are accounted grossest among men, and yet are greater rebels and enemies to God than men are.

But to be dead to sin goes deeper, and extends further than all these, namely, a most inward alienation of heart from sin, and most universal from all sin, an antipathy to the most beloved sin. Not only he must forbear sin, but hate it, I hate vain thoughts, and not only hate some, but all, I hate every false way. A stroke at the heart does it, which is the certainest and quickest death of any wound. For in this dying to sin, all the whole man of necessity dies to it, the mind dies to the device, and study of sin, that vein and invention becomes dead; the hand dies to the acting of it; the ear to the delightful hearing of things profane, and sinful; the tongue to the world's dialect of oaths, and rotten-speaking, and calumny and evil speaking, this is the commonest piece of the tongue's life in sin, the very natural heat of sin that acts and vents most that way; the eye dead to that intemperate look that Solomon speaks of, eyeing the wine when it is red, and well colored in the cup (Proverbs 23). That is, is taken with looking on the glittering skin of that serpent, till it bite, and sting, as there he adds. Dead to that unchaste look that sets fire in the heart, to which Job blindfolded and deadened his eyes, by an express compact, and agreement with them, I have made a covenant with mine eyes.

The eye of a godly man is not on the false sparkling of the world's pomp and honor and wealth, it is dead to them, quite dazzled with a greater beauty, the grass looks fine in the morning, when it is set with those liquid pearls, the drops of dew that shine upon it, but if you can look but a little while on the body of the sun, and then look down again, the eye is as it were dead, sees not that faint shining on the earth that it thought so gay before, and as the eye is blinded, and dies to it, so within a few hours it quite vanishes and dies itself.

Men think it strange that the godly are not of their diet, that their appetite is not stirred with the delights of dainties, they know not that such as be Christians indeed, are dead to those things, and the best dishes that are set before a dead man, give him not a stomach. The godly man's throat is cut to those meats, as Solomon advises in another subject. But why may not you be a little more sociable to follow the fashion of the world, and take a share with your neighbors, may some say, without so precise and narrow examining every thing? It is true, says the Christian, that the time was I advised as little with conscience as others, but sought myself, and pleased myself, as they do, and looked no further, but that was when I was alive to those ways, but now truly I am dead to them, and can you look for activity and conversation from a dead man; the pleasures of sin wherein I lived is still the same, but I am not the same. Are you such a snake, and a fool says the natural man as to bear affronts, and swallow them, and say nothing? Can you suffer to be abused so by such, and such a wrong? Indeed says the Christian again, I could once have resented an injury as you, or another, and had somewhat of that you call high-heartedness, when I was alive after your fashion, but now that humor is not only something cooled, but it is killed in me, it is cold dead as you say, and a greater spirit (I think) than my own, has taught me another lesson, has made me both deaf, and dumb that way, and has given me a new vent, and another language, and another party to speak to in such occasions, see for this, (Psalm 38:12-15). They that seek my hurt, speak mischievous things, and imagine deceits all the day long. What does he in this case? But I as a deaf man heard not, and I was as a dumb man that opens not his mouth, And why? For in you O Lord do I hope. And for this deadness that you despise, I have seen him that died for me, who when he was reviled, reviled not again.

This is the true character of a Christian dead to sin, but alas! Where is this Christian to be found, and yet thus is every one, that truly partakes of Christ; he is dead to sin really, hypocrites have a historical kind of death, like this, as players in tragedies. Those players have loose bags of blood, that receive the wound, so the hypocrite in some externals, and it may be, in that which is as near him as any outward thing, his purse, he may suffer some bloodshed of that for Christ, but this death to sin is not a sounding fit that one may recover out of again, the Apostle (Romans 6) adds, that he is buried.

But this is an unpleasant subject, to talk thus of death and burial, the very name of death, in the softest sense it can have, makes a sour melancholy discourse. It is so indeed, if you take it alone, if there were not for the life that is lost, a far better immediately following, but so it is here, living to righteousness succeeds dying to sin.

That which makes natural death so frightful, the king of terrors, as Job calls it, is mainly this faint belief, and assurance of the resurrection, and glory to come, and without this, all men's moral resolves and discourses are too weak cordials against this fear, they may set a good face on it, and speak big, and so cover the fear they cannot cure, but certainly they are a little ridiculous, that would persuade men to be content to die, by reasoning from the necessity and unavoidableness of it, which taken alone rather may beget a desperate discontent, than a quiet compliance, the very weakness of that argument is, that it is too strong, Durum telum. That of company is fantastic, it may please the imagination but satisfies not the judgment; nor are the miseries of life, though somewhat more proper a full persuasive for death, the oldest, most decrepit, most diseased persons, yet naturally fall not out with life, but could have a mind to it still, and the very truth is this, the worst cottage any dwells in they are loath to go out, till they know of a better. And the reason why that which is so hideous to others was so sweet to martyrs, (Hebrews 11:35) and other godly men, that have heartily embraced death, and welcomed it though in very terrible shapes, was, because they had firm assurance of immortality beyond it, the ugly death's head when the light of glory shines through the holes of it, is comely, and lovely. To look upon death as eternity's birthday, is that which makes it, not only tolerable but amiable. Hic dies postremus aeterni natolis est. Is the word I admire most of any heathen?

Thus here, the strongest inducement to this death, is the true notice and contemplation of this life, to which it sets us over, it is most necessary to represent this, for a natural man has as great an aversion every whit from this figurative death, this dying to sin, as from natural death, and there is the more necessity of persuading him to this, because his consent is necessary to it, no man dies this death to sin unwillingly, although no man is naturally willing to it, much of this death consists in a man's consenting thus to die: and this is not only a lawful, but a laudable, indeed a necessary self-murder, Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth, says the Apostle (Colossians 3:5). Now no sinner will be content to die to sin, if that were all, but if it be passing to a more excellent life, then he gains, and it were a folly not to seek this death. It was a strange power of Plato's discourse of the soul's immortality that moved a young man upon reading it, to throw himself into the sea, that he might leap through it, to that immortality: but truly, were this life of God, this life to righteousness, and the excellency and delight of it known, it would gain many minds to this death that steps into it.

There is a necessity of a new being to be the principle of new acting and motion; as the Apostle says, while you served sin you were free from righteousness, so it is, while you were alive to sin you were dead to righteousness: but there is a new breath of life from Heaven, breathed on the soul. Then lives the soul indeed, when it is one with God, and sees light in his light, has a spiritual knowledge of him, and therefore sovereignly loves him, and delights in his will, and that is indeed to live to righteousness, which in a comprehensive sense takes in all the frame of a Christian life, and all the duties of it, towards God and towards men.

By this new nature the very natural motion of the soul so taken is obedience to God, and walking in the paths of righteousness; it can no more live in the habitude and ways of sin, than a man can live under water. Sin is not the Christian's element; it is too gross for his renewed soul, as the water is for his body: he may fall into it, but he cannot breathe in it, cannot take delight and continue to live in it, but his delight is in the law of the Lord — that is the walk that his soul refreshes itself in. He loves it entirely, and loves it most where it most crosses the remainders of corruption that are in him; he bends the strength of his soul to please God, aims all at that, it takes up his thoughts early and late, has no other purpose in his being and living, but only to honor his Lord — that is to live to righteousness. He does not make a by-work of it, a study for his spare hours; no, it is his main business, his all. In this law does he meditate day and night. This life, as the other, is in the heart, and from there diffuses to the whole man; he loves righteousness, and receives the truth (as the Apostle speaks) in the love of it. A natural man may do many things that for their shell and outside are righteous: but he lives not to righteousness, because his heart is not possessed and ruled with the love of it; but this life makes the godly man delight to walk uprightly and to speak of righteousness, his language and ways carry the resemblance of his heart (Psalm 37:30-31). I know it is easiest to act that part of religion that is in the tongue; but the Christian ought not for that to be spiritually dumb: because some birds are taught to speak, men do not for that give it over and leave off to speak. The mouth of the righteous speaks wisdom, and his tongue talks of judgment, and his feet strive to keep pace with his tongue, which gives evidence of its unfeignedness. None of his steps shall slide, or he shall not stagger in his steps, but that which is between these is the common spring — the law of God is in his heart — of both; and from there, as Solomon says, are the issues of his life. That law in his heart is the principle of this living to righteousness.

The second thing here is the design or intention of this death and life, in the sufferings and death of Christ: he bore sin, and died for it, that we might die to it.

Out of some conviction of the consequence of sin, many have a confused desire to be justified, to have sin pardoned, and look no further, think not on the importance and necessity of sanctification, the nature of which is expressed by this dying to sin and living to righteousness.

But here we see that sanctification is necessary as inseparably connected with justification — not only as its companion, but as its end, which in some kind raises it above the other — that it was the thing which God eyed and intended in taking away the guiltiness of sin, that we might be renewed and sanctified. If we compare them in point of time, either backward, holiness was always necessary to happiness; but satisfying for sin and the pardon of it was made necessary by sin. Or if we look forward, the estate we are appointed to, and for which we are delivered from wrath, is an estate of perfect holiness. When we reflect upon that great work of redemption, we see it aimed at there — redeemed to be holy (Ephesians 5:25-26; Titus 2:14). And go yet higher to the very spring, the decree of election, and then it is said chosen before, that we should be holy; and in end it shall suit the design — nothing shall enter into the new Jerusalem that is defiled or unholy. Nothing but all purity there, not a spot of sinful pollution, not a wrinkle of the old man. For this end was that great work undertaken by the Son of God, that he might frame out of polluted mankind a new holy generation to his Father, that might compass his throne in the life of glory, and give him pure praises, and behold his face in that eternity. Now for this end it was needful according to the all-wise purpose of the Father that the guiltiness of sin and sentence of death should be once removed, and thus the burden of that lay upon Christ's shoulders on the cross; and that done, it is further necessary that souls so delivered be likewise purged and renewed, for they are designed to perfection of holiness in end, and it must begin here.

Yet is it not possible to persuade men of this, that Christ had this in his eye and purpose when he was lifted up upon the cross and looked upon the whole company of those his Father had given him to save — that he would redeem them to be a number of holy persons. We would be redeemed (who is there would not), but he would have his redeemed ones holy; and they that are not true to this his end, but cross and oppose him in it, may hear of redemption long and often, but little to their comfort. Are you resolved still to abuse and delude yourselves? Well, whether you will believe it or no, this is once more told you: there is unspeakable comfort in the death of Christ, but it belongs only to those that are dead to sin and alive to righteousness. This circle shuts out the impenitent world — there it closes and cannot be broken through — but all that are penitent are by their effectual calling lifted into it, translated from that accursed condition wherein they were. So then, if you will live in your sins, you may; but then resolve besides to bear them yourselves, for Christ in his bearing of sin meant it of none but such as in due time are thus dead and thus alive with him.

3. But then in the third place, Christ's sufferings and death effects all this. 1. As the exemplary cause, the lively contemplation of Christ crucified, is the most powerful of all thoughts to separate the heart and sin. But 2. besides this working as a moral cause, as that example; Christ is the effective natural cause of this death, and life: For he is one with the believer, and there is a real influence of his death, and life into their souls. This mysterious union of Christ, and the believer is that on which both their justification and sanctification and the whole frame of their salvation and happiness depends; and in this particular the Apostle still insists on it, speaking of Christ and believers as one in his death and resurrection, crucified with him, dead with him, buried with him, and risen with him (Romans 6).

Being arisen, he applies his death to those he died for, and by it kills the life of sin in them, and so is avenged on it, for its being the cause of his death according to that of the Psalm, raise me up that I may requite them. He infuses, and then actuates and stirs up that faith and love in them, by which they are united to him and these work powerfully in this.

3. Faith looks so steadfastly on its suffering Saviour, that as they say intellectus fit illud quod intelligit, it makes the soul like him, assimilates and conforms it to his death as the Apostle speaks. That which some fable of some of their saints of receiving the impression of the wounds of Christ in their body, is true in a spiritual sense of the soul of every one that is indeed a saint, and a believer, it takes the very print of his death, by beholding him, and dies to sin, and then takes that of his rising again, and lives to righteousness, as it applies it to justify, so to mortify, draws virtue from it. Thus said one, Christ aimed at this in all those sufferings that with so much love he went through, and shall I disappoint him, and not serve his end?

4. That other powerful grace of love is joint in this work with faith, for love desires nothing more than likeness, and conformity, though it be a painful resemblance, so much the better, and fitter to testify love, therefore it will have the soul die with him that died for it, and the very same kind of death, I am crucified with Christ, says the great Apostle. The love of Christ in the soul takes the very nails that fastened him to the cross, and crucifies the soul to the world, and to sin, love is strong as death, particularly in this, the strongest and liveliest body, when death seizes it, must yield, and so becomes motionless that was so vigorous before; and the soul that is most active, and unwearied in sin, when this love seizes it, it is killed to sin, and as death separates a man from his dearest friends, and society, this love breaks all the ties and friendship with sin. Generally, as Plato has it, love takes away one's living in themselves, and transfers into the party loved, but the divine love of Christ does it in the truest and highest manner.

By whose stripes you were healed] The misery of fallen man, and the mercy of his deliverance, are both of them such a deep, as no one expression, indeed, no variety added one to another can reach their bottom. Here we have diverse very significative ones. 1. The guiltiness of sin as an intolerable burden pressing the soul and sinking it, and that transferred and laid on a stronger back. He bore: Then 2. the same wretchedness under the same notion of a strange disease by all other means incurable, healed by his stripes. And (3.) again represented by the forlorn condition of a sheep wandering, and our salvation to be found only in the love and wisdom of our great shepherd. And all these are borrowed from that sweet and clear prophecy (Isaiah 53).

The polluted nature of man is no other but a bundle of desperate diseases, he is spiritually dead, as the Scriptures often teach. Now this contradicts not, nor at all lessens the matter: but only, because this misery justly called death, is in a subject animated with a natural life, therefore so it may bear the name and sense of sickness, or wound, and therefore it is gross misprision, they are as much out in their argument, as in their conclusion, that would extract out of these expressions any evidence of remains of spiritual life or good, in our corrupted nature: but they are not worthy the contest, though vain heads think to argue themselves into life, and are seeking that life by logic in miserable nature, that they should seek by faith in Jesus Christ, namely, in these his stripes by which we are healed.

It were a large task to name our spiritual maladies, how much more, severally to unfold their natures, such a multitude of corrupt false principles in the mind, that as gangrenes do spread themselves through the soul, and defile the whole man, and total gross blindness and unbelief in spiritual things, and that stone of the heart, hardness and impenitency, lethargies of senselessness and security, and then (for there be such complications of spiritual diseases in us, as in natural things are altogether impossible) such burning fevers of inordinate affections, desires of lust, and malice, and envy, such racking, and tormenting cares of covetousness, and feeding on earth and ashes, as the Prophet speaks in another case, according to the depraved appetite, that accompanies some diseases: such tumors of pride, and self-conceit that break forth, as filthy botches in men's words, and carriage one with another. And in a word, what a wonderful disorder must needs be in the natural soul by the frequent interchanges, and fight of contrary passions within it, and to these from without, how many deadly wounds we receive from the temptations of Satan and the world? We receive them, and by the weapons they furnish us, we willingly wound ourselves, as the Apostle says of them, who will be rich, they fall into diverse snares, and noisome lusts, and pierce themselves through with many sorrows.

Did we see it, no infirmary nor hospital ever so full of loathsome and miserable spectacles as spiritually our wretched nature is in any one of us apart: How much more when multitudes of us are met together? But our evils are hid from us, and we perish miserably in a dream of happiness. That makes up and completes our wretchedness, that we feel it not, with our other diseases. And this makes it worse still. This was the Church's disease (Revelation 3): "You say I am rich, and do not know that you are poor," etc. We are usually full of complaints of trifling griefs that are of small moment, and think not on, nor feel not our dangerous maladies, as he who showed a physician his forefinger, but the physician told him, he had more need to think on the cure of a dangerous abscess within him, which he perceived by looking to him, though himself did not feel it.

In dangerous maladies, or wounds, there be these evils, a tendency to death, and with that the apprehension of the terror, and fear of it, and the present distemper of the body by them, and this is in sin. 1. There is the guiltiness of sin binding over the soul to death, the most frightful eternal death. 2. The terror of conscience in the apprehension of that death, or wrath that is the consequent and end of sin. 3. The raging and prevailing power of sin, which is the ill habitude and distemper of the soul: But these stripes, and that blood that issued from them are a sound cure, applied to the soul, they take away the guiltiness of sin, and death deserved, and free us from our engagement to those everlasting scourgings, and lashes of the wrath of God, and likewise they are the only cure of those present terrors, and pangs of conscience arising from the sense of that wrath, and sentence of death upon the soul. Our iniquities that met on his back, laid open to the rod, which in itself was free, those hands that never wrought iniquity, and those feet that never declined from the way of righteousness, yet for our works and wanderings were pierced, and that tongue dropping with vinegar and gall on the Cross, that never spoke a guileful nor sinful word. The blood of those stripes are that balm issuing from that tree of Life so pierced, that can only give ease to the conscience, and heal the wounds of it, and they deliver from the power of sin working by their influence, and loathing of sin, that was the cause of them; they cleanse out the vicious humors of our corrupt nature, by opening up that issue of repentance they shall look on him, and mourn over him whom they have pierced.

Now to the end it may thus cure, it must be applied — it is the only receipt, but it must be received, if for healing. The most sovereign medicines cure not in another manner, and therefore still their first letter is R, recipe, take such a thing.

This is among those wonders of that great work, that the Sovereign Lord of all, that binds and looses at his pleasure the influences of Heaven, and the power and workings of all the creatures, would himself in our flesh be thus bound, the only Son bound as a slave, and scourged as a malefactor, and his willing obedience, made this an acceptable and expiating sacrifice, among the rest of his sufferings, he gave his back to the smiters.

Now it cannot be, that any that is thus healed, reflecting upon this cure, can again take any constant delight in sin, it is impossible so far to forget both the grief it bred themselves, and their Lord; as to make a new agreement with it, to live in the pleasure of it.

His stripes] Turn your thoughts all to consider this, you that are not healed, that you may be healed, and you that are, apply it still to perfect the cure in that part wherein it is gradual, and not complete, and for the ease you have found to bless and love him who endured so much unease to that end. There is a sweet mixture of sorrow, and joy in contemplating these stripes, sorrow sure by sympathy, that they were his stripes, and joy that they were our healing. Christians are too little mindful and sensible of this, and it may be somewhat guilty of that (Hosea 11:3): "They knew not that I healed them."