And then again, the mortification of Jesus is such a mortification whereby we are content our bodies should be like the body of Christ on earth, which is in all hardship, labour, afiliction, weariness ; and all God's people have such a spirit, all that come to heaven have such a spirit. They are not so dainty that their bodies should be better used than the body of Christ. Christ took upon him our flesh and our miserable condition, he took a nature subject to pain and labour. He took not our nature as in Adam, impassible, that could not sufier, but he took the weakness of our nature, and in our nature went about doing good, hungry, and thirsty and weary, and taking a great deal of pains ; and shall any man that is a member of Christ be so dainty and delicate as not to be content to have his body like as Christ's body was ? And therefore, the more that any man by Christ's Spirit is content, his body should take pains in any calling to do good, and the more he is content to suifer ill in doing good, the more he carrieth the mortification and dying of the Lord Jesus in him. And, beloved, so soon as ever a man is become a Christian, his life is no more his Own ; his health, his liberty is Christ's, not his own. Self-denial is the first lesson. There is a hatred, a not loving of anything in comparison of Christ, even of life itself, and whatsoever stands in the way ; and therefore we must be content to be partakers of Christ's sufierings, that our bodies should be so used as Christ was ; we must give up life and liberty and all to Christ ; and that is * the dying of the Lord Jesus.' This we shewed more largely upon the last day ; but I will now specially insist on the end and use of all this, ' that the life of Jesus may be made manifest in our mortal flesh.'
You see there is nothing lost by the dying of the Lord Jesus. It is made up in a better kind, being for this end, ' that the life of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies.' This is God's end, and this is Christ's end, and this is Paul's end. It is both the efiect and issue that cometh of the dying of our bodies, and it is the end intended by Christ, who will use our bodies in his service, so that his life may be made manifest in us. St Paul's end is suitable to Christ's in bearing the afilictions of the outward man, that the life of Christ may be made manifest in him ; for being once in Christ, Christ's aims and ends are our aims and ends ; and therefore saith Paul, we are content to ' bear in our bodies the dyings of the Lord Jesus,' so this be the issue of it, ' that the life of Jesus may be made mani- fest.' Christ will have this end, and it is his end. He taketh away no- thin« but he makes it up in a better kind to the better man. It shall * That is, ' dying.'— G.
2 CORINTHIANS CHAP. IV, XT.U. 10. 415
be supplied by a life of tbo Spirit, which shall be perfected in a life of glory in heaven.
Now what is this life of Jesus ?
There is a life of Jesus whereby he liveth himself, as God, and as media- tor, God-man. There is a life of Jesus whereby Christ was upheld while he lived upon the earth ; for that Spirit that quickened the dead body of Jesus in the gi'ave, that Spirit carried Christ alon^L( in all his lifetime, freed him from all dangers till he had done his work. There was a Spirit of life in Jesus that upheld him, and strengthened him to do the great work he took in hand, till at length he did a greater work than all before, that is, raised up his dead body. So that beside the life of Jesus enjoyed in heaven, a glorious life, there was a life that Jesus led on earth, which was carried by the Spirit, and acted by the Spirit of God in all things he did as media- tor, God-man. And there is a life that he hath now in heaven, which is either the life that he enjoyeth himself and as our head, whicli'lve shall be conformed to when we die ; for we shall enjoy the same life in our propor- tion and measure that he doth in heaven, the glorious life which is the life of Christ our head ; that is, that life of Christ which is now hid, as the apostle saith, ' our life is hid with Christ in God,' Col. iii. 3 ; or else the life of Jesus is that quickening power which comes from Christ unto us.
Not to speak of higher matters, how God is life, which be speculations, not to the present pui'pose, the life of Jesus here, it is not the life of Jesus as it is and was in himself, but the life of Jesus as it is convej^ed to us. The life of Jesus is derived to every Christian.