2. He who is a priest according to the order of a true and real 2)riesthood, he is a true and 7-eal priest. Believers are called priests, Rev. i. 6, and are said to offer up sacrifices to God, spiritual sacri- fices, such as God is pleased with, Heb. xiii. 16. Whence is it that they are not real and proper priests? Because they are not priests of any real order of priesthood, but are so called because of some allusion to and resemblance of the priests of old in their access unto God, 1 Pet. ii. 9; Eph. ii. 18; Heb. x. 22. This will also, by the way, discover the vanity of them among us who Avould have the ministers of the gospel, in contradistinction to other believers, be called priests. Of what order were they who did appropriate that appellation? The absurdity of this figment the learned Hooker could no otherwise defend than by affirming that priest was an al)-
400 VlNDICIiE EVANGELIC^.
"breviation of presbyter, when both in truth and in the intendment of them that used that term, its sense was otherwise. But to return. The sons of Aaron were properly priests. Why so? Because they were so appointed in the line of the priesthood of Levi, according to the order of Aaron. Hence I assume, Christ being called a priest according to the order of a true and proper priesthood, was truly and properly so. He was " a priest after the order of Melchizedek," Ps. ex. 4 ; which the apostle often insists on in the Epistle to the Hebrews. If you say that Christ is called " a priest after the order of Melchi- zedek," not properly, but by reason of some proportion and analogy, or by way of allusion to hira, you may as well say that he was a priest according to the order of Aaron, there being a great similitude be- tween them; against which the apostle expressly disputes in the whole of the 7th chapter to the Hebrews. He therefore Avas a real priest, according to a real and proper order.
8. Again ; he that was appointed of God to offer sacrifices for the sins of men was a priest properly so called; but that Christ did so and was so appointed will appear in our farther consideration of the time when he was a priest, as also in that following, of the sacrifice he offered, so that at present I shall not need to insist upon it.
4. Let it be considered that the great medium of the apostolical persuasion against apostasy in that Epistle to the Hebrews consists in the exalting of the priesthood of Christ above that of Aaron. Now, that which is only metaphorically so in any kind is clearly and evi- dently less so than that which is properly and directly so. If Christ be only metaphorically a priest, he is less than Aaron on that con- sideration. He may be far more excellent than Aaron in other respects, yet in respect of the priesthood he is less excellent ; which is so directly opposite to the design of the apostle in that epistle as nothing can be more.
It is, then, evident on all these considerations, and might be made farther conspicuous by such as are in readiness to be added, that Christ was and is truly and properly a high priest; which was the first thincj designed for confirmation.
The Racovian Catechism doth not directly ask or answer this ques- tion, Whether Christ be a high priest properly so called? but yet insinuates its author's judgment expressly to the contrary: —
The sacerdoial office of Christ is placed herein, that as by his kingly office he can help and relieve our necessities, so by his sacerdotal office he will help, and actually doth so ; and this way of his helping or relieving us is called his sacrifice.'
Thus they begin. But, — 1. That any office of Christ should be- speak power to relieve us without a will, as is here affirmed of his
' " ^lunus igitur sacerdotale in eo situm est, quod quemadmodum pro regie raunere potest nobis iu omnibus nostris ncccssitatibus subvenire, ita pro munere sacerdotali subvenirc vult, ac porro subvenit ; atque hsec illius subveniendi, seu opis afferendEB ratio, sacrificinm pjus appellatur," — Cat. Rao. de raun. Chris, .oacer. q. 1.
OF Christ's priestly office. 401
kingly, is a proud, foolish, and ignorant fancy. Is this enough for a king among men, that he is able to relieve his subjects, though he be not willing? or is not this a proper description of a wicked tyrant? Christ as a king is willing as well as able to save, Isa. xxxii. 1, 2.
2. Christ as a high priest is no less able than willing also, and as a king he is no less willing than able, Heb. vii. 25. That is, as a king he is both able and willing to save us, as to the application of salva- tion and the means thereof; as a priest he is both willing and able to save us, as to the procuring of salvation and all the means thereof.
3. It is a senseless folly, to imagine that the sacrifice of Christ consists in the manner of affording us that help and relief which as a king he is able to give us. Such weak engines do these men apply for the subversion of the cross of Christ ! But of this more afterward.