2. Likewise we may know it h)j our sympathy and antipathy — our sympathy with them that be good, and antipathy to that which is naught.* There is a love of that which is good. So things, good things, are con- natural to a good man. There is a relish in good company and good
* That is, ' naughty,' = wicked. — G.
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things. As there is sweetness in the best things, so there is something in the children of God that is answcniblo to the God whom they serve. He is never so out of taste but he findcth his chief comfort in this thing, and he is never himself so much as when ho is conversant in these things, though in different measure : sometimes more, and sometimes less. There is an inward antipathy to God in a proud carnal man that hath not his heart subdued by grace ; there is a contrariety to the power of that grace which outwardly he professcth, and a sympathy with the world and the spirit of the world. Take a good Christian at the worst, he is better than another at the best. I beseech you, therefore, examine our dispositions ; how we stand affected to things of an higher nature than the things of the world ; to spiritual things, how we can reUsh spiritual things, God's ordi- nances, and anything that is holy. Surely if there be the life of God and Christ in us, there will be a kind of connaturalness and suitableness of taste to the sweetness that is in holy things.
To come to the next, mark the order here, ' Go to my Father, and your Father.' We are the sons of God at the second hand. God is the Father of Christ first, and then ours. He is his God first, then our God.
This is a weighty point for directing of our devotions, that we may know in what order to look on God. See God in Christ ; see all things in Christ first, and then in us. Look upon him as Father to Christ, and then to us. Look on him as a God to Christ first, and in Christ a God to us. Look on him as having elected us, but elect in Christ first. See ourselves justi- fied, but see Christ justified first from our sins, and his justification declared by his resurrection. See our resurrection and ascension, and glorification in heaven, not directly, but in Christ our head, who is in heaven, and taketh up place for us. See God loving us, but look on it in Christ, who is sedes cunoris* The next thing to God is his Son, and he loveth none but in him. When we consider of any spiritual blessing, say with the apostle, ' Blessed be God, that hath filled us with all spiritual blessings in Christ,' Eph. i. 3. Otherwise we do not know ourselves nor God. Whatsoever is derived from God to us is through Christ. All pro- mises are his first. They are made to him, and to our nature in him, and they are performed for his sake. He taketh them from God the Father, and they be performed for his sake. He is the true Aaron. We are but the skirts. The oil that is poured upon his head runneth down to his skirts. It runneth to the meanest Christian ; but the ointment of grace is first poured on his head. ' Of his grace we receive grace for grace, and of his fulness,' John i. 10. The first i'uluess is God himself ; the second receptacle of all is Christ, God- man ; the third are we ; we have it at the third hand. God emptieth himself into Christ, as mediator. In him are the fulness of all riches, the treasures of all wisdom and knowledge. We are completed in him, and in him we are full. His is not only a fulness of the vessel, as ours is, but a fulness of the fountain.
And it is for our comfort that it is so, that God's love is to Christ first. There is a firm foundation when God loveth us in his Son, and we are children in his natural Son, in whom we are adopted. Then our state is firm. Our first state in the first Adam was not firm, but now our nature is taken into the unity of the second person, it is firm. So that the love and care and fatherly disposition of God towards us, it is sweet to us, because it is tender to his Son. It is eternal to us, because it is eternal to him. He can as soon cease to love his Son, as cease to love us. For with * That is, ' seat of love.' — G.
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the same love he loveth all Christ mystical, head and members. There is not the least finger of Christ, the least despised member of Christ, but God looketh on him with that sweet eternal tenderness with which he looketh upon his Son, preserving the prerogative of the head. Oh, this is a sweet comfort, that now all the excellent privileges of a Christian are set on Christ and then on us ; and therefore we should not lose them, for Christ will lose nothing. When the favour of a prince is founded on his son whom he always loveth, the affection is unalterable on the son, and therefore the case is good. So God's favour to us is founded on his love to his Son, and therefore unalterable and eternal. We should therefore look up to God in his Son ; put up all our petitions to him in his Son ; expect all from him in his Son. He is in heaven for us, to do that that belongeth to us. Expect all from God through Christ, and do all to God through Christ ; love God in Christ, and Christ in God ; ourselves in Christ, and ourselves in the love of God. Christ is in God, and God is in Christ. God and Christ are in us. There is a marvellous sweet relation and communion between God and us, and Christ and us. It is a sweet communion, and mysterious to us. How sweet is the communion between the soul and the body, the soul being so spiritual, and the body a piece of earth ! But what is this to the mystery of mysteries, when God takes clay and dust into unity of his per- son ; and all this is for this union. The great and glorious union of Christ to our natures is that he may take us into his mystical body, and so make us one with himself, and one with the Father. He took our natures that he might convey his fatherly goodness and love and Spirit to us. The sweet union of the two natures of Christ is to confirm union between the Father and us, and Christ and us. And we are never happy till we be assured that we are one with Christ, which is the issue of his excellent prayer, John xvii.