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300 AN EXPOSITION OF THE [ CHAP. IX,
Lord Christ, as the high priest of the church, wherein, according unto the will of God, and what was required of him by virtue of the eternal compact between the Father and him concerning the redemption of the church, he gave up himself, in the way of most profound obedience, to do and suffer whatever the justice and law of God required unto the expiation of sin; expressing the whole by the shedding of his blood, in answer unto all the typical represen- tations of this his sacrifice in all-the institutions of the law.
And this offering of Christ was proper sacrifice,—
(1.) From the office whereof it was an act. It was an act of his sacerdotal office; he was made a priest of God for this end, that he might thus offer himself, and that this offering of himself should be a sacrifice.
(2.) From the nature of it. For it consisted in the sacred giving up unto God the thing that was offered, in the present destruction or consumption of it. This was the nature of a sacrifice; it was the destruction and consumption by death and fire, by a sacred action, of what was dedicated and offered unto God. So was it in this sacrifice of Christ. As he suffered in it, so in the giving himself up unto God in it there was an effusion of his blood and the destruc- tion of his life.
(3.) From the end of it, which was assigned unto it in the wisdom and sovereignty of God, and in his own intention; which was to make atonement for sin: which gives an offering the formal nature of an expiatory sacrifice.
(4.) From the way and manner of it. For therein,—
[1.] He sanctzfied or dedicated himself unto God to be an offer- ing, John xvii. 19.
[2.] He accompanied it with prayers and supplications, Heb. v. 7.
[3.] There was an altar which sanctified the offering, which bore it up in its oblation; which was his own divine nature, as we shall see immediately.
[4.] He kindled the sacrifice with the fire of divine love, acting itself by zeal unto God’s glory and compassion unto the souls of men,
[5.] He tendered all this unto God as an atonement for Sin, as we shall see in the next words.
This was the free, real, proper sacrifice of Christ, whereof those of old were only types and obscure representations; the prefiguration hereof was the sole cause of their institution. And what the Soci- nians pretend, namely, that the Lord Christ offered no real sacri- fice, but only what he did was called so metaphorically, by the way of allusion unto the sacrifices of the law, is so far from truth, as that there never had been any such sacrifices of divine appointment but only to prefigure this, which alone was really and substantially so. The Holy Ghost doth not make a forced accommodation of what
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VER. 13, 14.] EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 301
Christ did unto those sacrifices of old, by way of allusion, and by reason of some resemblances; but shows the uselessness and weak- ness of those sacrifices in themselves, any further but as they repre- sented this of Christ.
The nature of this oblation and sacrifice of Christ is utterly over-
thrown by the Socinians. They deny that in all this there was any offering at all; they deny that his shedding of his blood, or any thing which he did or suffered therein, either actually or passively, his obedience, or giving himself up unto God therein, was his sacri- fice, or any part of it, but only somewhat required previously there- unto, and that without any necessary cause or reason, But his sacrifice, his offering of himself, they say, is nothing but his appear- ance in heaven, and the presentation of himself before the throne of God, whereon he receiveth power to deliver them that believe in him from the punishment due to sin, But,— * (1.) This appearance of Christ in heaven is nowhere called his oblation, his sacrifice, or his offering of himself. The places wherein some grant it may be so, do assert no such thing; as we shall see in the explanation of them, for they occur unto us in this chapter.
-(2.) It no way answers the atonement that was made by the blood of the sacrifices at the altar, which was never carried into the holy place; yea, it overthrows all analogy, all resemblance and typical representation between those sacrifices and this of Christ, there being no similitude, nothing alike between them. And this renders all the reasoning of the apostle not only invalid, but altogether im- pertinent.
(3.) The supposition of it utterly overthrows the true nature of a proper and real sacrifice,- substituting that in the room of it which is only metaphorical, and improperly so called. Nor can. it be evi- denced wherein; the metaphor doth consist, or that there is any ground why it should be called an offering or a sacrifice; for all things belonging to it are distinct trom, yea, contrary unto a true,
real sacrifice.
(4.) It overthrows the nature of the priesthood of Christ, making it to consist in his actings from God towards us in a way of power; whereas the nature of the priesthood is to act with God for and on the behalf of the church.