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power of the world. This love hath suffered on purpose to redeem us from all this.
3. The care and tenderness ivhich the Lord Jesus Christ continues to manifest towards us, now he is in heaven, while we are upon the earth, is another fruit of this love. Heb, v. 2, this high priest knows how to " have compassion on the ignorant, and them that are out of the way." Chap. iv. 1 5, He hath been " touched with the feeling of our infirmities," and " in all points tempted like as we;" and " he ever liveth to make intercession for us." In these things he expresses his love to, and care for, his people.
On the other side, I say, the love of believers to Christ is inexpres- sible, or beyond all other love whatsoever.
1. In a way of value. Matt. xiii. 45, when the merchant-man had found the precious pearl, he sells all he hath to buy it. Believers will part with all they have to obtain Christ ; for they prefer him above all. What will they not part with, and what do they not part with and deny, for Christ? Whereby you may see it is a love that is transcendent to all other loves.
(1.) They part with their sin, lust, and corruption. There is not a believer in the world but hath naturally as great a love of, and ad- herence to, sin, lust, and corruption, as the highest debauched person upon the face of the earth; but a believer will part with them all, subdue them all, so that he might win Christ : which manifests it to be a transcendent love. And they that will not do this are not be- lievers. If our hearts are not engaged to the mortifying of all sin, lust, and corruption, as he enables us, we are not married to Christ; for " they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh, with the affections and lusts," Gal. v. 24.
(2.) They will part with their righteousness for Christ. This was that the Jews would not give up, that they might obtain justification. They had a righteousness which was according to the law; and, saith the apostle, Rom. x. 3, " They will not submit to the righteousness of God, but go about to establish their own righteousness." All the righteousness which is in the world, that the men of the world value before Christ, while they are engaged in their lusts and pleasures, they will not part with it for Christ; — yea, even when they are wrought off their lusts and pleasures by conviction to some duties, yet they will not part with their own righteousness for Christ. But believers will part with theirs, and count it all as loss and dung.
If corruption be subdued, and righteousness be given wp, what remains ? Truly, —
(3.) Self remains. If a man denies not himself in lawful things, in any thing that will hinder his walking with God and living unto God, which will make him unfaithful in his place or unfruitful, to
470 THE EXCELLENCY OF CHRIST.
please God, he is not worthy of him. If he cannot deny his ease, liberty, peace, profit, or pleasure, he is not worthy of Jesus Christ. Now, that love which will carry a man out to deny all ungodliness and lust, to renounce all his own righteousness, to lose all he hath wrought in his own strength, to deny himself upon every instance wherein Christ requires him ; — this is a transcendent love, above all other love whatsoever.
2. The love of believers manifests itself also in suffering for Christ; and 0 Avho can tell what the martyrs endured from love to the Lord Jesus !
So that this psalm, which treats of the espousals of Christ and be- lievers, may well have this title, — " A Song of loves;" it being the most excellent love.
Two things, from hence, are incumbent upon us : —
First. To labour to get a sense of this love of Christ upon our hearts. If we are believers, all this love of Christ, who is " King of kings, and Lord of lords," is fixed upon every one of our souls; and it is our great duty to labour to let in a sense of this love of Christ into them. Out of his abundant love and grace, and for no other reason in the world, he loved us when we were strangers, — he re- conciled us to himself when we were enemies, and engaged in enmity against him; give him, then, the glory of his sovereign grace with respect to your own souls. And, —
Secondly. Let us examine ourselves whether we have this trans- cendent love to Jesus Christ in our hearts. If we have, it will con- tinually keep us up to the mortification of lust and corruption, to the renouncing of all self-righteousness, to the denying ourselves; and it will make us continually ready for all the service and suffering Christ shall call us unto.
SERMON VII.1
" My heart is inditing a good matter: I speak of the things which I have made touching the King ; my tongue is the pen of a ready writer. Thou art fairer than the children of men; grace is poured into thy lips: therefore God hath blessed thee for ever. Gird thy sword upon thy thigh, O most Mighty, with thy glory and thy majesty." — Ps. xlv. 1-3.