Fifthly, "That it represents the Son as more kind and compassion- ate than the Father; tvhereas if both be the same God, then either the Father is as loving as the Son, or the Son as angry as the Father."
Ans. 1. The Scripture referreth the love of the Father unto two heads: — (1.) The sending of his Son to die for us, John iii. 16; Rom. V. 8; 1 John iv. 9, 10. (2.) In choosing sinners unto a participa- tion of the fruits of his love, Eph. i. 3-6. The love of the Son is fixed signally on his actual giving himself to die for us, Gal. ii. 20 ; Eph. v. 25; Rev. i. 5. What balances these persons have got to
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weigh these loves in, and to conclude which is the greatest or most weighty, I know not. 2. Although only the actual discharge of his office be directly assigned to the love of Christ, yet his condescension in taking our nature upon him, — expressed by his mind, Phil. ii. 5-8, and the readiness of his will, Ps. xl. 8, — doth eminently comprise love in it also. 8. The love of the Father in sending of the Son was an act of his will; which bemg a natural and essential property of God, it was so far the act of the Son also, as he is partaker of the same nature, though eminently, and in respect of order, it was peculiarly the act of the Father. 4. The anger of God against sin is an effect of his essential righteousness and holiness, which belong to him as God ; which yet hinders not but that both Father, and Son, and Spirit, acted love towards sinners. They say again, —
Sixthly, " It robs God of the gift of his Son for our redemption, which the Scriptures attribute to the unmerited love he had for the world, in affirming the Son jyurchased that redemption from the Father, by the gift of himself to God as our complete satisfaction."
Ans. 1. It were endless to consider the improper and absurd ex- pressions which are made use of in these exceptions, as here; the last words have no tolerable sense in them, according to any principles whatever. 2. If the Son's purchasing redemption for us, procuring, obtaining it, do rob God of the gift of his Son for our redemption, the Holy Ghost must answer for it; for, having " obtained" for us, or procured, or purchased, "eternal redemption," is the word used by him- self, Heb. ix. 12; and to deny that he hath laid down his life a "ran- som" for us, and hath " bought us with a price," is openly to deny the gosjiel. 3. In a word, the great gift of God consisted in giving his Son to obtain redemption for us. 4. Herein he " offered himself unto God," and "gave himself for us;" and if these persons are offended herewithal, what are we, that we should withstand God ? They say, —
Seventhly, " Since Christ could not pay what was not his own, it folloius, that in the payment of his own the case still remains equally grievotis; since the debt is not hereby absolved or forgiven, but ti^ans- ferred only ; and, by consequence, we are no better jjrovided for salva- tion than before, owing that now to the Son which was once owing to the Father."
Ans. The looseness and dubiousness of the expressions here used makes an appearance that there is something in them, when indeed there is not. There is an allusion in them to a debt and a payment, which is the most improper expression that is used in this matter ; and the interpretation thereof is to be regulated by other proper expressions of the same thing. But to keep to the allusion : — 1. Christ paid his own, but not for himself, Dan. ix. 26. 2. Paying it for us, the debt is discharged; and our actual discharge is to be given out
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according to the ways and means, and upon the conditions, appointed and constituted by the Father and Son. 3. When a debt is so trans- ferred as that one is accepted in the room and obhged to payment in the stead of another, and that payment is made and accepted accordingly, all law and reason require that the original debtor be discharged. 4. What on this account we owe to the Son, is praise, thankfulness, and obedience, and not the debt which he took upon himself and discharged for us, when we were nonsolvent, by his love. So that this matter is plain enough, and not to be involved by such cloudy expressions and incoherent discourse, following the metaphor of a debt. For if God be considered as the creditor, we all as debtors, and being insolvent, Christ undertook, out of his love, to pay the debt for us, and did so accordingly, which was accepted with God; it follows that we are to be discharged upon God's terms, and under a new obliofation unto his love who hath made this satisfaction for us : which we shall eternally acknowledge. It is said, —
Eighthly, " It no way renders men beholden or in the least obliged to God, since by their doctrine he luould not have abated us, nor did he Christ, the least farthing; so that the achioiuledgments are pecidiarly the Sons: which destroys the whole current of Scrip- ture testimony for his good-will towards men. 0 the infamous portraiture this doctrine draujs of the infinite goodness! Is this your retribution, 0 injurious satisfactionists?"