2. What is the sense of those words, ' in the flesh ' ? Is it meant of the flesh of Christ, or our flesh ? Both make a good sense ; I prefer the latter. First, he condemned sin in the flesh, or by the crucified body of Christ, exacting from him the punishment due to sin. Secondly,
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in our flesh, that is sin, which by our flesh rendereth us uncapable of fulfilling the law of God, or obnoxious to his vengeance. This was destroyed by the death of Christ, ' Our old man was crucified with him,' Kom. vi. 6 : and in conversion the virtue is applied to us, when sin received its death's wound by virtue of Christ's death or sacrifice.
Use 1 is, Information. 1. To show the heinous nature of sin. God hath put a brand upon it, and showed how odious it is to him. Nothing short of the death of Christ could expiate such a breach between God and his creatures ; Christ must die, or no reconciliation. Christ's death doth lessen and greaten sin ; it greatens the nature of it, to all serious beholders ; it lesseneth the damning effect of it to the penitent believer.
2. If Christ came to destroy sin, accursed are they that cherish it. These seek to put their Kedeemer to shame, tie the cords the which he came to unloose : 1 John iii. 8. Christ ' came to destroy the works of the devil.'
3. Christ did not abrogate the law, but took away the effects and consequents of sin committed against the law. The sinner was obnox- ious to the justice of the lawgiver and judge ; the law could not help him, but the Son of God came to fit us again for our obedience.
Use 2 is. To exhort us to consider first our misery. How unavoid- able our perishing was, had not God found out a remedy for us. In our corrupt estate, we neither could nor would obey the law ; the duty became impossible, both as to the tenor of the law, and the temper of our hearts, and then the penalty is intolerable.
2. Our remedy lies in the incarnation and passion of the Son of God, that in so entangled a case he could find out a ransom for us. The goodness of God, that he sent his own Son ; the power of God, that by this means the guilt and power of sin, with all the consequents of it, are dissolved.
Use 3 is, Direction in the Lord's Supper. 1. Here is the flesh of Christ, which is food for souls: John vi. 51, ' The bread that I shall give is my flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.' In it he hath purchased grace and pardon of sin, which are the foundations of immortality.
2. The Lord's Supper is a feast on a sacrifice, a commemoration of Christ's sin-offering, or a standing memorial of his passion ; a table spread for us in the sight of our enemies. How must we be conversant about it, as the Jews about the sacrifices ? First, there is required an humble, broken, and contrite heart, confessing our sins : Ps. xlvi. 17, * The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit ; a broken and contrite heart, 0 God, thou wilt not despise.' Secondly, sensible, thankful, and com- fortable, owning of God's love in Christ. When they had eaten the Passover, they were to rejoice before the Lord : Deut. xvi. 11. So should we after this feast prepared by God to feed and nourish our souls to eternal life.
430 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIIL [SeR. Y.
SERMON V.
That the righteousness of the law might he fulfilled in us, tvho icalk not after the flesh, hut after the spirit. — Rom. viii. 4.
Here is the second end of our deliverance by Christ, that we might have grace to keep the law of God. The first was, that sin might be condemned in the flesh. In the words we have : —
1. A benefit.
2. The persons that receive it.
First, The benefit. That the righteousness of the law might he fulfilled in us. How is this to be understood? of justification, or sanctification ?
They that expound it in the former way, make this the sense, that Christ's active obedience, or fulfilling the law, might be imputed, and reckoned to us, as if done by us ; but I cannot like this interpretation. First, because it is contrary to the apostle's scope, who speaketh not of Christ's active obedience, but the fruits of his death, or his being made a sin-offering for us. Secondly, the words will not bear it, for the apostle doth not say that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled for us, but fulfilled in us. Thirdly, the doctrine itself is not sound, unless rightly interpreted ; for though God, upon the account of Christ's passive obedience and satisfaction, doth forgive our sins, and his active obedience, as well as his passive, is the meritorious cause of our justifi- cation, as being a part of his humiliation, yet that cannot be said to be fulfilled in us, which was done by Christ ; for God cannot be mistaken, and reckon us to fulfil the law, which we have not, and will not lie, and say we did it, when we did it not. It is enough to say, Christ obeyed, and suffered for our sakes, so as we might have the fruit and benefit of it. Fourthly, the consequent is pernicious, to say the law is fulfilled in us, as obeyed by Christ, for then we needed not to fulfil it ourselves ; it is done to our hands already, and needeth only to be imputed to us by faith ; but Christ, who suffered, that we might not suffer, yet did not obey, that we might not obey ; but his obedience being part of his humiliation, is an ingredient into his satisfaction for our sins. Christ fulfilled all righteousness, and suffered, that our imperfection of obedi- ence might not be our ruin.