It is a metaphor taken from mechanics, who do artificial!}',! fit one part of their work to another, and so finish the whole ;, God fitted liis Son s body to be joined with the deity, and to be an expiatory sacri- fice for sin : 1 Pet, ii. 24, * Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree,' &c. The word avro^, himself, hath a great emphasis, and therefore that evangelical prophet Isaiah mentions it no less than five times in that Isa. liii. 4, 5, 7, 11, 12. Christ had none to help or uphold him under the heavy burden of our sins and his Father's wrath, Isa. Ixiii. 3. It is most certain, that in the work of man's redemption Christ had no coadjutor. He who did bear our sins, that is, the punishments that were due to our sins, in his own body on the tree ; he did assume flesh, cast into the very mould and form of our bodies, having the same several parts, members, linea- ments, the same proportion which they have. Christ's body was no spectrum or phantasm, no putative body, as if it had no being but what was in appearance and from imagination — as the Marcionites, Mani- chees, and other heretics of old affirmed, and as some men of corrupt minds do assert in our days — but as real, as solid a body as ever any was. And therefore the apostle calls it a body of flesh. Col. i. 22 — a body, to shew the organisation of it, and a body of flesh, to shew the reality of it, in opposition to all aerial and imaginary bodies. Christ's body had all the essential properties of a true body ; such as are organicalness, extension, local presence, confinement, circumscription, penetrability, visibility, palpability, &c., as all the evangelists do abundantly witness. Take a few instances for all : Luke xxiv. 39, ' Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself, handle me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have.' Christ here admits of -tlie testimony of their own senses to assure them that it was no vision or spirit, but a true and real body risen from the dead, which they now saw. Certainly whatever is essential to a true glori- fied body, that is yet in Christ's body. Those stamps of dishonour that the Jews had set upon Christ by wicked hands, those he retained after his resurrection, partly for the confirmation of his apostles, and partly to work us to a willingness and resoluteness to suffer for him when we are called to it : 1 John i. 1, ' That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the word of life.' He alludes to the sermons which he and the other apostles heard from Christ's own mouth, and also to the glorious testimony which the Father gave once and again from heaven to Christ. He alludes also to the miracles that were wrought by Christ, and to that sight that they had of his glory in the mount, and to his resurrection and visible ascension into the highest heaven, Mat. xvii., Acts i. He alludes to the familiar conversation which the apostles had with Christ for about three years, and also to that touching, when after the resurrection Christ offered himself to the apostles that believed not in him to touch him, Luke xxiv. The truth of these things were confirmed to them by three senses — hear- ing, seeing, handling, the latter still surer than the former ; and this proves Christ to be a true man, as his being from the beginning sets 1 Artfully = skilfully.— G.
170 THE MANHOOD OF CHRIST PROVED.
out his deity. Christ had also those natural affections, passions, in- firmities, which are proper to a body, as hunger : Mat. iv. 2, ' When he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterwards an hun- gered.' All Christ's actions are for our instruction, not all for our imitation. Matthew expressly makes mention of nights, lest it should be thought to be such a fast as that of the Jews, who fasted in the day, and did eat at the evening and in the night, [Chemnitius.] He would not extend his fast above the term of Moses and Elias, lest he should have seemed to have appeared only, and not to have been, a true man. He was hungry, not because his fasting wrought upon him, but be- cause God left man to his own nature, [Hilary.] It seems Christ felt no hunger till the forty days and forty nights were expired, but was kept by the power of the Deity, as the three children^ or rather cham- pions, from feeling the heat of the fire, Dan. iii. 27. Christ fasted forty days and forty nights, and not longer, lest he might be thought not to have a true human body ; for Moses and Elias had fasted thus long before, but never did any man fast longer. When Christ began to be hungry the tempter came to him, not when he was fasting. The devil is cunning, and will take all the advantage he can upon us. During the forty days and forty nights the devil stood doubtful, and durst not assault the Lord Jesus, partly because of that voice he heard from heaven, ' This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased,' Mat. iii. 17, and partly because his forty days and forty nights' fast did portend some great thing : but now, seeing Christ to be hungry, he impudently assaults him. Christ was not hungry all the forty days ; but after, he was hungry, to shew he was man. Some think that Christ by his hunger did objectively allure Satan to tempt him, that so he might overcome him, as soldiers sometimes feign a running away, that they may the better allure their enemies closely to pursue them, that so they may cut them off, either by an ambush or by an orderly facing about : so the devil tempted Christ as man, not knowing him to be God ; or if he did know him to be God, Christ did as it were encourage his cowardly enemy, that durst not set upon him as God, shewing himself to be man. And as Christ was hungry, so Christ was thirsty : John iv. 7, ' There came a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me drink.' Here you see that he that is rich and Lord of all became poor for us, that he might make us rich, 2 Cor. viii. 9 ; and he that gives to all the creatures their meat in due season, Ps. civ. 27, he begs water of a poor tankard-bearer to refresh himself in his weariness and thirst : John xix. 28, ' Jesus saith, I thirst.' Bleeding breeds thirsting. Sleeping : Mat. viii. 24, he was asleep, to shew the truth of the human nature, and the weak- ness of his disciples' faith. Christ was in a fast and dead sleep, for so much the Greek word, eKcidevSe, signifies : his senses were well and fast bound, as if he had no operation of life, and therefore the disciples are said to raise him, as it were from the dead. The same Greek word is used in many places where mention is made of the resurrection, as you may see by comparing the scriptures in the margin together, i He was asleep, [1.] By reason of his labour in preaching and journey he slept ; [2.] To shew forth the truth of his human nature. Some think
^ John ii. 19 ; Mat. xxvii. 52; 1 Cor. xv. 12.