THE PROPER END OF THE DEATH OF CHRIST ASSERTED. 203
tion, and adoption into the family of God ; all fruits flowing from it in sanctification and universal holiness ; with all other privileges and enjoyments of believers here, which follow the redemption and recon- ciliation purchased for them by the oblation of Christ. A real, effectual, and infallible bestowing and applying of all these things, — as well those that are the means as those that are the end, the con- dition as the thing conditioned about, faith and grace as salvation and glory, — unto all and every one for whom he died, do we maintain to be the end proposed and effected by the blood-shedding of Jesus Christ, with those other acts of his mediatorship which we before declared to be therewith inseparably conjoined: so that every one for whom he died and offered up himself hath, by virtue of his death or oblation, a right purchased for him unto all these things, which in due time he shall certainly and infallibly enjoy; or (which is all one), the end of Christ's obtaining grace and glory with his Father was, that they might be certainly bestowed upon all those for whom he died, some of them upon condition that they do believe, but faith itself absolutely upon no condition at all. All which we shall farther illustrate and confirm, after we have removed some false ends assigned.
CHAPTER II.
Containing a removal of some mistakes and false assignations of the end of the
death of Christ.
That the death, oblation, and blood-shedding of Jesus Christ is to be considered as the means for the compassing of an appointed end was before abundantly declared ; and that such a means as is not in itself any way desirable but for the attaining of that end. Now, be- cause that which is the end of any thing must also be good, for unless it be so it cannot be an end (for bonum et finis convertuntur), it must be either his Father's good, or his own good, or our good, which was the end proposed.
I. That it was not merely /w's ownh exceedingly apparent. For in his divine nature he was eternally and essentially partaker of all that glory which is proper to the Deity ; which though in respect of us it be capable of more or less manifestation, yet in itself it is always alike eternally and absolutely perfect. And in this regard, at the close of all, he desires and requests no other glory but that which he had with his Father " before the world was," John xvii. 5. And in respect of his human nature, as he was eternally predestinated, without any foresight of doing or suffering, to be personally united, from the instant of his conception, with the second person of the Trinity, so neither while he' was in the way did he merit any thing for himself
204 TPIE DEATH OF DEATH. [BOOK II.
by his death and oblation. He needed not to suffer for himself, being perfectly and legally righteous; and the glory that he aimed at, by "enduring the cross, and despising the shame," was not so much his own, in respect of possession, by the exaltation of his own nature, as the bringing of many children to glory, even as it was in the pro- mise set before him, as we before at large declared. His own exalta- tion, indeed, and power over all flesh, and his appointment to be Judge of the quick and the dead, was a consequent of his deep humi- liation and suffering; but that it was the effect and product of it, procured meritoriously by it, that it was the end aimed at by him in his making satisfaction for sin, that we deny. Christ hath a power and dominion over all, but the foundation of this dominion is not in his death for all ; for he hath dominion over all things, being appointed *' heir of them, and upholding them all by the word of his power," Heb. i. 2, 3, " He is set over the works of God's hands, and all things are put in subjection under him," chap. ii. 7, 8. And what are those " all things," or what are amongst them, you may see in the place of the psalmist from whence the apostle citeth these words, Ps. viii. 5-8. And did he die for all these things ? Nay, hath he not power over the angels? are not principalities and powers made subject to him? Shall he not at the last day judge the angels? for with him the saints shall do it, by giving attestation to his righteous judgments, 1 Cor. vi. 2, 3 ; — and yet, is it not expressly said that the angels have no share in the whole dispensation of God manifested in the flesh, so as to die for them to redeem them from their sins? of which some had no need, and the others are eternally excluded: Heb. ii. 1 6, " He took not on him the nature of angels ; but he took on him the seed of Abraham." God setting him " king upon his holy hill of Zion," in despite of his enemies, to bruise them and to rule them " with a rod of iron," Ps. ii. 6, 9, is not the immediate effect of his death for them, but rather all things are given into his hand out of the immediate love of the Father to his Son, John iii. 35; Matt. xi. 27. That is the foundation of all this sovei-eignty and dominion over all creatures, with this power of judging that is put into his hand.