1. For whom he prayeth ; for his persecutors, men that had done him the greatest contempt and villany which their spite and malice could invent. They had mocked and buffeted him, mangled his flesh with scourges, led him like a public spectacle of shame through the streets of the city, and by importunate clamours had gotten him to the cross, and there placed him in the midst of thieves. They had cursed themselves, and yet Christ prayed fm' them. In their rage they had even appealed to and dared divine justice : ' His blood be upon us and on our children ; ' but Christ saith, ' Father, forgive them.' Yea, and which is more, they did all this to him when he came to serve the world in a design of the greatest love. Of all things, men cannot endure to have their love slighted. Holy David, when Nabal slighted his kindness, vowed the destruction of him and all his house ; but when Christ cometh with higher acts of kindness, he is despised and rejected of men : ' He came unto his own, and his own received hira not,' John i. 11. Nay, his own persecuted him, and despitefully used him, and yet he prayeth forthem. They omitted no kind of cruelty. The law saith, ' Breach for breach, e)^e for eye, tooth for tooth,' Lev. xxiv. 20 ; but when they cry, ' Crucify him,' he €ries, ' Forgive them.' Oh, how may we wonder at this, who are so vindictive as we are !
2. When he prayeth; in the very extremity and height of his sufferings. Then, when we are apt to forget our friends, Christ remembereth his enemies; in the very height of his sorrows he mediates for a pardon for them. A man would have thought that the sharp sense of the afflictions wherewith he was exercised should have em- bittered his spirit ; if he would make intercession for sinners in lieaven, a man would have thought that he should not have interceded upon the cross. We pardon when the misery is over, and, by the course of affairs, that which was intended for a mischief proveth an advantage ; as Joseph did his brethren : Gen. 1. 20, ' As for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass as it is this day, to save much people alive.' But Christ in the very act of his sufferings seeketh mercy for the instruments of his passion. PendehcU, et tamen petehat, saith Austin ; their rage had brought him to the cross, and tliere Christ mediateth to bring them to heaven.
3. AVho prayeth ; Jesus Christ. With honour enough to himself he might have done otherwise; he could have destroyed them with the breath of his mouth or with a beam of his glory. We forgive when we cannot harm. Power efferateth the mind, and makes men fierce and cruel. Many would be cruel enough, but they are restrained
SERMON UPON LUKE XXIII. 34. 17
either by want of power or opportunity. But here neither was want- ing : Mat. xxvi. 53, ' Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray unto my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels ? ' In man's eye that would have seemed a rare vindication of the glory and dignity of his person ; but Christ doth not pray. Father, send twelve legions of angels, but, ' Father, forgive them.' One angel had been enough : 2 Kings xix. 35, ' The angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand.' It would have been more easy for Christ to come down from the cross than to go up thither, that was the greater miracle. Four nails could not have held the Lord of glory, if he had not been nailed and fastened through by his own love and voluntary condescension. But Christ would not be glorious now in acts of power, but of mildness and charity, and therefore it is not, Father, destroy, but. Father, forgive them.
4. How he prayeth for them. He pleadeth their case, and putteth the fairest construction that can be made of an action so foul and enormous ; they are poor ignorarlt people, led with a blind zeal. Christ pitcheth upon the only circumstance that serveth to lessen the offence ; of all excuses this is the most plausible : 1 Tim. i. 13, ' I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly, in unbelief ; ' Acts iii. 17, ' And now, brethren, I wot that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers.' We are wont to strain and force actions to the most rigorous interpretation they are capable of. Iracundia solei^s estfingendi causas suifuroris — Seneca. Anger is witty to find out causes to justify itself ; and if there be aught to justify censure, we omit those alleviating cir- cumstances and necessary mitigations, whereby our asperity may be taken off, and actions be more mildly considered. But Christ saith, Poor creatures 1 they act out of a blind zeal, they know not what they do ; Father, forgive them.
Use 1. Information.
1. It informeth us that the love of Christ is greater than we can think or understand, much less express. If we be afflicted with any pain in the teeth, head, or eyes, we are so overcome with the sense of it, that we can think of nothing else ; we neither admit the visit of friends, nor will we trouble ourselves with any business, our pain wholly engros- seth and taketh up our minds and thoughts. But Jesus Christ, in the midst of his agonies and painful sufferings, remembereth not only friends, but enemies, and is solicitous about their salvation. Now if he be thus affected towards persecutors, how is he to the persecuted ? They cry, 'Crucify him ! crucify him ! ' but he saith, ' Father, forgive them.' He might justly have called for vengeance, but he prayeth for mercy ; nothing was so cruel but they were ready to think, and speak, and do against him in this blind and inconsiderate fury ; but he doth not con- sider their injuries against himself, but their sin against God, and would have that pardoned ; and this at the time when they sought not pardon for themselves, but were venting their malice against him. Which surely is an encouragement to the penitent that he will not be hard to be entreated by them that confess and forsake their sins, and fly unto him for mercy. He seeks for pardon for them that sought it not, and considereth not so much what they deserved, as what became himself,