3. Thirdly, Then in the sufferings of Christ, as in a gospel-glass, you may see the odious nature of sin, and accordingly learn to hate it, arm against it, turn from it, and subdue it. Sin never appears so odious as when we behold it in the red glass of Christ's sufi'erings, Ps. cxix,, civ., cxiii., cxxviii., and Eom. vii, 15, and xii. 9. Can we look upon sin as the occasion of all Christ's sufferings, can we look upon sin as that which made Christ a curse, and that made him forsaken of his Father, and that made him live such a miserable life, and that brought him to die such a shameful, painful, and cruel death, and our hearts not rise against it ? Shall our sins be grievous unto Christ, and shall they not be odious unto us ? shall he die for our sins, and shall not we die to our sins ? did not he therefore suffer for sin, that we might cease from sin ? did not he ' bear our sins in his own body on the tree, that we being dead to sin, should live to righteousness ' ? 1 Pet. iv. 1, and ii. 24. If one should kill our father, would we hug and embrace him as our father ? no, we would be revenged on him. Sin hath killed our Saviour, and shall we not be revenged on it. Can a man look upon that snake that hath stung his dearly-beloved spouse to death, and preserve it alive, warm it at the fire, and hug it in his bosom, and not rather stab it with a thousand wounds ? It is sin that hath stung our dear Jesus to death, that has crucified our Lord, clouded his glory, and shed his precious blood, and oh, how should this stir up our indignation against it. Ah, how can a Christian make much of those sins that killed his dearest Lord ! how can he cherish those sins that betrayed Christ, and apprehended Christ, and bound Christ, and condemned Christ, and scourged Christ, and that violently drew him to the cross, and there murdered him ! It was neither Judas, nor Pilate, nor the Jews, nor the soldiers that could have done our Lord Jesus the least hurt, had not our sins, like so many butchers and hangmen, come in to their assistance. After Julius Caesar was
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treacherously murdered in the senate-house, Antonius brought forth his coat, all bloody, cut and mangled, and laying it open to the view of the people, said, Look, here is your emperor's coat ; and as the bloody conspirators have dealt by it, so have they dealt with Caesar's body ; whereupon the people were all in an uproar, and nothing would satisfy them but the death of the murderers, and they ran to the houses of the conspirators and burnt them down to the ground. But what was Cassar's coat and Caesar's body to the body of our dear Lord Jesus, which was all bloody, rent, and torn for our sins ? Ah, how- should this provoke us to be revenged on our sins 1 how should we for ever loathe and abhor them 1 how should our fury be whetted against them ! how should we labour with all our might to be the death of those sins that have been the death of so great a Lord, and will, if not prevented, be the death of our souls to all eternity 1 To see God thrust the sword of his pure, infinite, and incensed wrath through the very heart of his dearest Son, notwithstanding all his supplications, prayers, tears, and strong cries, Heb. v. 7, is the highest discovery of the Lord's hatred and indignation of sin that ever was or will be. It is true God discovered his great hatred against sin by turning Adam out of para- dise, and by casting the angels down to hell, by dro^vning the old world, and by raining hell out of heaven upon Sodom and Gomorrah, and by the various and dreadful judgments that he has been a-pouring forth upon the world in all ages ; but all this hatred is but the picture of hatred, to that hatred which God manifested against sin in causing the whole curse to meet upon our crucified Lord, as all streams meet in the sea. It is true God discovers his hatred of sin by those endless, Baseless, and remediless torments that he inflicts upon devils and damned spirits ; but this is no hatred to that hatred against sin which God discovered when he opened all the floodgates of his envenomed wrath upon his Son, his own Son, his only Son, his Son that always pleased him, his Son that never offended him, Isa. liii. 5, 6, and Prov. viii. 30, 31, and Mat. iii. 17. Should you see a father that had but one son, and he such a son in whom he always delighted, and by whom he had never been provoked ; a son that always made it his business, his work, his heaven to promote the honour and glory of his father, John viii. 49, 50, and ix. 4 ; a son who was always most at ease when most engaged in his father's service ; a son who counted it his meat and drink to do his father's will, John iv. 34 : now should you see the father of such a son inflicting the most exquisite pains and punish- ments, tortures and torments, calamities and miseries upon this his dearest son, you would readily conclude that certainly the sins, the offences that have put the father upon exercising such amazing, such matchless severity, fury and cruelty upon his only son, are in^nitely hateful, odious, and abominable to him.i Now, if you please but to cast your eye upon the actings of God the Father towards Jesus Christ, you will find that he hath inflicted more torments and greater tor- ments upon the Son of his dearest love, than all mortals ever have or could iriflict upon their only sons : Isa. liii. 6, ' The Lord hath laid
^ Jer. xliv. 4, and Zech. viii. 17. The Rabbins, to scare their scholars from sin, used to tell them that sin made God's head ache ; but I may say sin hath made Christ's head ache, and his heart ache too.
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upon him the iniquity of us all,' Heb., hath made the iniquities of us all to meet on him, or to light or fall on him rather. God made all the penalties and sufferings that were due to us to fall upon Jesus Christ, as a man is wont to fall with all his might, in a hostile manner, upon his enemy. God himself inflicted upon dear Jesus whatsoever was requisite to the satisfying of his justice, to the obtaining of pardon, and to the saving of all his elect : ver. 10, 'It pleased the Lord to bruise him, he hath put him to grief.' All the devils in hell, nor all the men upon earth, could never have bruised or put to grief our Lord Jesus. If it had not pleased the Lord to bruise him and put him to grief, he had never been bruised or put to grief. Oh, how should this work us to look upon sin with indignation !