Christ's request for union is again repeated, with the advantage of another expression, to declare the nature of it. So that in this verse we have —
1. The nature of the mystical union.
2. The end of it ; with respect to believers and the world ; their conviction of Christ's mission, and the Father s love to the disciples.
First, The nature of this union further declared, ' I in them, and thou in me.'
Here first observe, that one union is the ground of another. Christ and the Father are one, and then Christ and we are one, and then we are one, one with another. The assumed nature is united to the divine essence in Christ's person ; and so he, as mediator, is one with the Father ; and then we by the communion of the Spirit . are not only united to the head, but to our fellow-members.
There are two unions spoken of in this verse.
1. With God, that is implied ; the Father is a believer's as well as Christ : John xiv. 23, ' My Father will love him, and we will come to him, and make our abode with him.' Why then doth Christ say, ' I in them ' ? Not to exclude the Father ; for he presently addeth, ' Thou in me.' Christ speaketh as mediator, to show that he is the cause, way, and means. He is the Jacob's ladder: John i. 51 ' Verily I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.'
2. There is a union with Christ immediately ; that is formally ex- pressed, ' I in them.' And then between us and others of the same body, ' That they may be made perfect in one ; '. all drawn up into
VeR. 23.] SERMONS UPON JOHN XVII. 63
unity with God in Christ. First, God descendeth in the person of Christ, and then we all ascend by Christ, and come up to God again. Thus the personal union maketh way for the mystical, and the mystical for our joint communion with God in the same body. This is the great mystery that hath been driving on from all eternity, the Father is the beginning and ending, and Christ the means. All influence Cometh from God through Christ, and our tendency is to him through Christ : 1 Cor. viii. 6, * To ns there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him ; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, alid we by him.' All mercies come to us, and our services and respects go to God, through Christ. The reason is, we are departed from God by sin ; so that God is removed from us, and God is against us, at a distance, and at an enmity ; and we are fugitives and exiles, as Adam ran away from God before he was banished out of his presence. Therefore Christ is not only a meri- torious cause of the union that is between us and God, but also the bond and tie of it. To satisfy God offended, this he might do as a Saviour without us ; but to be a means of influence on God's part, and respect and service on ours, to convey grace, and return service, he must be in us : 'I in them.' As exiles, we are taken into grace and favour by the merit of Christ ; and as fugitives, we are brought into unity again by his Spirit working in us. Therefore it is said : Eph. i. 10, ' That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth, even in him.' There God descendeth, and we ascend. All the scattered elect are brought into a body, to receive influences of grace from God as a fountain, through Christ as a con- veyance. So Eph. ii. 18. * For through him we have an access by one Spirit unto the Father.' All believers are united into a body by the communion of Christ's Spirit, that by Christ they may perform service to God, and receive grace from him.
Use. Is to prize Christ as mediator, and to make use of him in your addresses to God. Heathens had many ultimate objects of worship, and many mediators ; we have but one.
1. If you perform anything to God, do it in and through Christ, 'in whom he is well pleased,' Mat. iii. 17. A holy God will accept nothing, but as tendered in Christ's name. We cannot endure the majesty of his presence : Col. iii. 17, ' And whatsoever ye do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him ; ' by the assistance of his grace and dependence upon his merit, that is to do all in Christ's name. We are made amiable to God in Christ ; out of Christ we are odious to God : Ps. xiv. 2, 3, * The Lord looketh down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are altogether become filthy ; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.' Once God looked on the creatures all good, but that was in innocency ; after the fall he looked on the creatures, and all are become filthy ; it is not meant of any particular sort of men, but all in their natural condition. The apostle bringeth that place to prove the universal corruption of nature, Rom. iii. 10, that is, out of Christ. But as he looketh on us in Christ, so we are amiable ; he is well-pleased