(3.) The cause of this mortality is, ' Because of sin.' Had it not been for sin, we had never had cause to fear dissolution ; there had been no use for cofiSns and winding sheets ; nor had we been beholden to a grave, to hide our carcase from the sight and smell of the living ; there was a posse mori in innocency, else death could not be threatened
VeR. 10] GERMONS UPON ROMANS VIII. 15
as a penalty ; but there was a posse non mori, or else immortality could not be propounded as the reward of obedience ; therefore man is mortal, conditione corporis; but immortal, heneficio conditori ; God could have supported him. Well then, death must make sin odious ; or else sin allowed will make death terrible.
3. We come to the assertion or correction, ' The Spirit is life because of righteousness.' In which observe, —
[1.] That believers have a life, notwithstanding death. Though death be appointed by God, and inflicted upon believers as well as others, yet they live, notwithstanding this death : John xi. 25, ' He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.' The fountain of life can raise him when be will ; no bands of death can hinder his quickening virtue. Though the union between body and soul be dissolved, yet not their union with G-od.
[2.] This life is to be understood of body and soul. It is only indeed here said life, but he explaineth himself in the 2d ver. ' If the Spirit of liim that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead, shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.' Man is compounded of a body and soul ; death deprives him of his body for a time, only the body shall at last be reunited to partake of the happiness of the soul.
(1) The soul, being the noblest part, is presently, and most happily provided for, being sanctified and purified from all her imperfections, and is brought into the sight and presence of God : Luke xx. 38, ' They all live to God.' And they are gathered to the great council and assembly of souls, Heb. xii. 23. There they serve God day and night, and are under a happy necessity of never wandering from their duty, and no longer busied to maintain a war against sin, but we are always employed in lauding, praising, and blessing God, and delighting in him. Well then, this is the happiness of the faithful, that though they put off the body for a time, yet the soul hath an eternal house, to which it retireth, and remains not only in the hand of God, but enjoyeth the sight and love of God : 2 Cor. v. 1, ' For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.'
(2.) For the body. At the resurrection the soul shall assume its body again. We cannot easily believe that part shall be placed in heaven, which we see committed to the grave to rot there ; but there is no impediment to God's almighty power: Phil. iii. 21, 'Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able to subdue all things unto himself.' This place doth prove that God hath provided for the happy estate of the body as well as the soul. The dead are God's subjects, put into the hands of Christ ; he must give an account of them : John vi. 40, ' And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one that seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have ever- lasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day.' They are likewise members of Christ, 1 Cor. vi. 15. Now this mystical body will not be maimed ; they are temples of the Holy Ghost : 1 Cor. vi. 15 — temples wherein we offer up to God reasonable service. Now since the Spirit possesseth both body and soul, he will repair his own dwelling-place
16 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIII. [SeR. XIII.
which he hath once honoured with his presence, and not let corruption always abide on it. And we have the pattern of Christ ; he is the first fruits of them that slept : 1 Cor. xv. 20. The soul hath an inclin- ation to the body still ; therefore that our happiness may be complete, a glorified soul shall animate an immortal body.
[3.] The grounds are, first, the Spirit's renewing ; secondly, Christ's purchase.
(1.) The Spirit is life. He doth not draw his argument from the immortality of the soul, for that is common to good and bad ; the wicked have a soul that will survive the body, but little to their com- fort ; their immortality is not a happy immortality ; but he taketh his argument from the new life wrought in us by the Spirit, which i.s the beginning, pledge, and earnest of a blessed immortality. The soul is an immortal being, but the new life is an eternal principle of happi- ness ; as soon as Christ beginneth to dwell in us, eternal life is begun in our souls, 1 John iii. 15 ; the immortal seed, 1 Pet. i. 23.