Other consequential affections:— 1. On the part of Christ — He values his saints — Evidences of that valuation:— (1.) His incarnation; (2.) Exinanition, 2 Cor. viii. 9; Phil. ii. 6, 7; (3.) Obedience as a servant; (4.) In his death. His valuation of them in comparison of others. 2. Believers’ estimation of Christ:— (1.) They value him above all other things and persons; (2.) Above their own lives; (3.) All spiritual excellencies. The sum of all on the part of Christ — The sum on the part of believers. The third conjugal affection — On the part of Christ, pity or compassion — Wherein manifested — Suffering and supply, fruits of compassion — Several ways whereby Christ relieves the saints under temptations — His compassion in their afflictions. Chastity, the third conjugal affection in the saints. The fourth — On the part of Christ, bounty; on the part of the saints, duty.
II. Christ values his saints, values believers (which is the second branch of that conjugal affection he bears towards them), having taken them into the relation whereof we speak. I shall not need to insist long on the demonstration hereof; heaven and earth are full of evidences of it. Some few considerations will give life to the assertion. Consider them, then, — 1. Absolutely; 2. In respect of others; and you will see what a valuation he puts upon them:—
1. All that ever he did or doth, all that ever he underwent or suffered as mediator, was for their sakes. Now, these things were so great and grievous, that had he not esteemed them above all that can be expressed, he had never engaged to their performance and undergoing. Take a few instances:—
(1.) For their sakes was he “made1 flesh;” “manifested in the flesh.” Heb. ii. 14, “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same.” And the height of this valuation of them the apostle aggravates. Verse 16, “Verily he took not on him the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of Abraham;” he had no such esteem of angels. Whether you take ἐπιλαμβάμεσθαι, properly to “take,” or to “take hold of,” as our translators, and so supply the word “nature,” and refer the whole unto Christ’s incarnation, who therein took our nature on him, and not the nature of angels; or for ἀναλαμβάνεσθαι, to “help,” (he did not help nor succour fallen angels, but he did help and2 succour the seed of Abraham,) and so consider it as the fruit of Christ’s incarnation, — it is all one, as to our present business: his preferring the seed of Abraham before angels, his valuing them above the other, is plainly expressed. And observe, that he came to help the seed of Abraham, — that is,3 believers. His esteem and valuation is of them only.
(2.) For their sakes he was so made flesh, as that there was an emptying, an exinanition of himself, and an eclipsing of his glory, and a becoming poor for them, 2 Cor. viii. 9, “Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for our sakes he became poor.” Being rich in eternal glory with his Father, John xvii. 5, he became poor for believers. The same person that was rich was also poor. That the riches here meant can be none but those of the Deity, is evident, by its opposition to the poverty which as man he undertook. This is also more fully expressed, Phil. ii. 6, 7, “Who being in the form of God, counted it no robbery to be equal to God, but he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, and being made in the fashion of a man, and found in form as a man,” etc. That the “form of God” is here the essence of the Deity, sundry things inevitably evince; as, —
[1.] That he was therein4 equal to God; that is, his Father. Now, nothing but God is equal to God. Not5 Christ as he is mediator, in his greatest glory, — nothing but that which is infinite, is equal to that which is infinite.
[2.] The form of God is opposed to the form of a servant; and that form of a servant is called the “fashion of a man,” verse 8, — that fashion wherein he was found when he gave himself to death, wherein as a man he poured out his blood and died. Μορφὴν δούλου λαβὼν, (he “took the form of a servant”), is expounded in the next words, ἐν ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων γενόμενος, — an expression used to set out his incarnation, Rom. viii. 3. God sent him ἐν ὁμοιώματι σαρκὸς ἁμαρτίας· in taking true flesh, he was in the “likeness of sinful flesh.” Now, in thus doing, it is said ἑαυτὸν ἐκένωσε, — “he humbled, emptied himself, made himself of no reputation.” In the very taking of flesh, there was a condescension, a debasing of the person of the Son of God; it could not be without it. If God humbled himself to “behold the things that are in heaven, and in the earth,” Ps. cxiii. 6, then certainly it was an inconceivable condescension and abasement, not only to behold, but take upon him (into personal union) our nature with himself. And though nothing could possibly be taken off from the essential glory of the Deity, yet that person appearing in the fashion of a man, and form of a servant, the glory of it, as to the manifestation, was eclipsed; and he appeared6 quite another thing than what indeed he was, and had been from eternity. Hence he prays that his Father would “glorify him with the glory he had with him before the world was,” John xvii. 5, as to the manifestation of it. And so, though the divine nature was not abased, the person was.