2. It informs us also of this truth, that there is a communion be- tween Christ and his people. The reproach that lightetli upon the members reflecteth upon the head : Isa. Ixiii. 9, ' In all their afflictions he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them.' Look to the context, and you shall see he plainly alludes to the angel of the covenant that he spake of before. So Zech. ii. 8, ' He that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye ; ' what is done to them, is done to him, either by way of injury or courtesy. So Mat. xxv. 34, 'Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me ; ' and Acts ix. 4, ' Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me ? ' And to come closer to the notion of the text : 2 Cor, i. 5, ' As the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.' All that we endure are called the sufferings of Christ. Nay, nearer yet, it is called Christ's reproach : Heb. xiii. 13, 'Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach.' Well, the meaning is this — Moses j'ielded to be contemned with the people of God, out of faith in the Messiah to come. All the Israelites were an abomination to the Egyptians, Gen. xlvi. 34, and they handled them ignominiously ; yet Moses counted them the people of God, and the people of Christ, and therefore he chose to profess himself to be one of them, and he esteemed the reproach of Christ above all the treasures of Egypt. Thus I have opened the things that are compared.
2. The preference of the one above the other — ' He esteemed the re- proach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt ; ' that is a far more desirable thing than all the wealth and power of that country. Mark, it is not said only he was willing to bear his share in their re- proach ; no, but he esteemed it, and esteemed it as riches and treasures ; that is more emphatical.
Secondly, His ground for all this, what was that which induced him so to esteem this ignominious people of God before his honour in the court ? — ' For he had respect unto the recompense of reward.' There observe the thing, and his respect to it.
1. The thing itself, and what it was that did cast the balance. A blessed eternity that he had in his eye, called ' the recompense of re- ward,' that was that he looked to. By the reward we must understand the great and final reward of eternal glory, which is given by God, and received and enjoyed by us as a compensation for all our sufferings.
2. His regard of it — ' He had respect unto the recompense.' The word is cLTre^XeTre. Look, as eVe/SXeTre is to look towards a thing ; so a7re/9A,e7re is to look off from one thing to another ; it signifies a re- moval of the eye from one object to behold another. Apply this now
VeR. 26.] SERMONS UPON HEBREWS XL 463
to the eye of tlie mind, and the sense is, he turned his mind and heart from the treasures, honours, and pleasures of Egypt, and fixed them upon the rewards of godliness, or the honours, riches, and pleasures of heaven. The word seems to be best explained by the apostle, 2 Cor. iv. 18, 'While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen ; ' there is the taking oif the eye from things temporal, and fixing it on things that are eternal ; shutting the eye of sense, and opening that of faith. If we did look oftener from that which is present to that which is to come, we should be much wiser than we are. In short, he knew his reproach would be recompensed with exceeding great glory and happiness, which God hath promised to all afflicted believers. Therefore turning off his eye from what was before him to that which was to come, the temptation took no hold of him.
Doct. We are not right christians till we have such an esteem of Christ, that the worst things which can befall us in his service should be more to us than the best things of the world.
This was done by Moses, as the text shows ; and this was done also by the apostle Paul : Phil. iii. 8, ' Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord : for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung that I may win Christ.' Paul might have made his market with the Pharisees, by whom he was highly esteemed, and intrusted with a commission to persecute the church of God ; but wdien once the light of the gospel shined into his heart, then all his Jewish honours and prerogatives were loss and dross in comparison of his gain by Christ ; and when he had leisure to review what he had done, he repented not of his bargain — ' I have counted,' yea, and ' I do account ' these things loss for Christ. All things compared with Christ, or set in opposition to Christ, were base and vile in his eyes ; so base that a word bad enough could not be found to express his indignation and contempt of them, therefore he calls it aKi/SvXa, we express it dung ; it is a thing fit to be thrown to the dogs, that they might not be a snare to him.