(1.) God and man must be brought together. Some of the wise
124 AX EXI'OSITION, -SVITU NOTES, [JaS. I. 18.
heathens ])laccd hapi)iness in the nearest access and approacli to God that may be, as Plato for one ; and Coelius Khodiginus, saith Aristotle, delighted much in that verso of Homer where it is said that it would never be well till the gods and mortal men did come to live together. Certain we are that common instinct maketh us to grope and feel after an eternal good : Acts xvii. 27, * They groped after God/ Now, how shall we come to have any commerce with God, there being, besides the distance of oin* beings, guilt contracted in the soul ? How can stubbie dwell with devouring burnings? guilty creatures think of God without trembling ? approach him without being devoured and swallowed up of his glory ? The heathens were sensible of this in some i)art, and therefore held that the supreme gods were defiled by the unhallowed approaches of sinful and mortal men, and therefore invented heroes and half-gods, a kind of middle powers, that were to be mediators, to convey their prayers to the gods, and the blessings of the gods back again to them : so Plutarch, Bia Baifiovltou iraaa ofiCKia KoX SidXeKTo^ fjLera'^u dewv kol dvOpcoTTOiv — that by these intermediate powers there was all commerce and communion between the gods and men. To this doctrine of the heathen the ai)Ostle alludeth, 1 Cor. viii. 5 ; the heathens had ' lords many, and gods many ; ' as they had many gods, many ultimate objects of worship, so many lords, that is, mediators. ' But to us (saith he) there is but one Lord, and one God ; ' that is, one supreme essence and one Mediator, which is that excellent and sure way which the scriptures lay down for our com- merce with God. The device of the heathens, being fabulous and absurd, could not yield comfort ; but in the gospel there is excellent provision made for our comfort and liope, for there the Godhead and manhood is represented as met in one nature. The Son of God was made the Son of man, that the sons of men might be the sons of God ; therefore the apostle Peter showeth that the great work of Christ was 'to bring us to God,' 1 Peter iii. 18, to bring God and man together. So the apostle Paul saith, Heb x. 20, we may ' draw near through the veil of his flesh.' It is an allusion to the temple, where the veil hid the glory of the sanctum sanctorum, and gave entrance to it. So Christ's incarnation did, as it were, rebate the edge of the divine gloiy and brightness, that creatures may come and converse with it without terror. Christ is the true Jacob's ladder, John i. .51, the bottom of which toucheth earth — there is his humanity ; and the top reacheth heaven — there is his divinity ; so that we may climb this ladder, and have communion with God : ascende jjci' homincm et pcrvenics ad Deum, as that father said — climbing up in \io\)Q by the manhood of Christ, we have social access to the Godhead.
(2.) Justice and mercy must be brought together. We want mercy, and fear justice ; guilt impre.sseth a trembling upon the spirit, be- cause we know not how to redeem our souls out of the hands of angry justice; tlie very heathens were under this bondage and torment, because of the severity of the divine justice : ' Knowing the judgment of God, they thought themselves worthy of death,' Rom. i. 32. Tliere- fore the great incjuiry of nature is, how we shall appease angry justice, and redeem our souls from this feai-. You know the question,
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Micah vi. G, 7, * Wherewith shall I come before him ? and wherewith will he be pleased ? ' The heathens, in their blindness, thought to oblige the Godhead by acts meritorious (as merit is natural), either by costly sacrifices, ' rivers of oil, thousands of rams, burnt-offerings, and whole burnt-offerings,' hecatombs of sacrifices ; or by putting them- selves to pains or tortures, as Baal's priests gashed themselves ; or by doing some act that is unwelcome and displeasant to nature, as by offering their children in sacrifices, those dear pledges of affection, which certainly was an act of great self-denial, natural love being descensive, and like a river running downward ; yea, this was not all, the best of their children, their iirst-born, in whom all their hopes were laid up, they being observed to be most fortunate and successful. And this custom also the carnal Jews took up, for bare outward sacri- fice was but a dull way either to satisfy God (his being ' the cattle of a thousand hills,' Ps. 1. 10), or to pacify conscience ; for though it were a worship of God's own appointing, yet it ' did not make the comer thereunto perfect, as appertaining to the conscience/ Heb. ix. 9 ; that is, the worshipper that looked no further could never have a quiet and perfect conscience, and therefore they ' caused their children to pass through the fire to Moloch.' Such a barbarous custom could not be taken up barely by imitation ; nothing but horror of conscience could tempt men to an act so cruel and unnatural ; and the prophet plainly saith, they ' gave their first-born for the sin of their soul.' Thus you see all ways are at a loss, because they could not yield a recompense to offended justice. But, in the gospel, 'justice and mercy have kissed each other, righteousness and truth have met together,' as it is Ps. Ixxxv. 10. And we may sing, ' Gracious is the Lord, and righteous,' Ps. cxvi. 5 ; ' Our beloved is white and ruddy,' Cant. V. 10. For there is a God satisfying as well as a God offended, so that mercy and justice shine with an equal lustre and glory ; yea, justice, which is the terror of the world, in Christ is made our friend, and the chief ground of our hope and support ; as 1 John i. 9, 'The Lord is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins.' A man would have thought faithful and gracious had been a more proper term than faithful and righteous, pardon being most properly an act of free grace ; but justice being satisfied in Christ, it is no derogation to his righteousness to dispense a pardon. fSo the crown of glory is called ' a crown of righteousness,' 2 Tim. iv. 8. There is a whole vein of scriptures runneth that way, that make all the comfort and hope of a Christian to hang upon God's righteousness ; yea, if you will believe the apostle Paul, you shall see that God's great intent in appointing Christ, rather than any other Eedeemer, was to show himself just in pardoning, and that he might be kind to sinners without any wrong to his righteousness ; in short, that justice being satisfied, mercy might have the freer course. Hear the apostle, and you shall see he speaketh full to this purpose : Rom. iii. 25, 26, ' Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness in the remission of sins.' And lest we should lose the emphatical word, he redoubleth it : 'To declare, I say, his righteous- ness, and that he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus ; ' that is, in the matter of justification, where grace is most