The second thing wherein we may behold the glory of Christ, given him of his Father, is in the mysterious constitution of his Person, as he is God and man in one and the same person. There are in him, in his one single individual person, two distinct natures; the one, eternal, infinite, immense, almighty, — the form and essence of God; the other, having a beginning in time, finite, limited, confined unto a certain place, — which is our nature, which he took on him when he was “made flesh, and dwelt among us.” The declaration of the nature of this glory is a part of my discourse of the Person of Christ, whereunto I refer the reader:— my present design is of another nature.
This is that glory whose beams are so illustrious, as that the blind world cannot bear the light and beauty of them. Multitudes begin openly to deny this incarnation of the Son of God, — this personal union of God and man in their distinct natures. They deny that there is either glory or truth in it; and it will ere long appear (it begins already to evidence itself) what greater multitudes there are, who yet do not, who yet dare not, openly reject the doctrine of it, who in truth believe it not, nor see any glory in it. Howbeit, this glory is the glory of our religion, — the glory of the church, — the sole Rock whereon it is built, — the only spring of present grace and future glory.
This is that glory which the angels themselves desire to behold, the mystery whereof they “bow down to look into,” 1 Peter i. 12. So was their desire represented by the cherubim in the most holy place of the tabernacle; for they were a shadow of the ministry of angels in the church. The ark and the mercy seat were a type of Christ in the discharge of his office; and these cherubim were made standing over them, as being in heaven above; but earnestly looking down upon them in a posture of reverence and adoration. So they did of old; and in their present contemplation of it consists no small part of their eternal blessedness.
Hereon depends the ruin of Satan and his kingdom. His sin, so far as we can conceive, consisted of two parts. 1. His pride against the person of the Son of God, by whom he was created. “For by him were all things created that are” (or were when first created) “in heaven, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or power,” Col. i. 16. Against him he lifted up himself; — which was the beginning of his transgression. 2. Envy against mankind, made in the image of God, of the Son of God the first born. This completed his sin; nothing was now left whereon to act his pride and malice. Unto his eternal confusion and ruin, God, in infinite wisdom, unites both the natures he had sinned against in the one person of the Son; who was the first object of his pride and malice. Hereby his destruction is attended with everlasting shame in the discovery of his folly, wherein he would have contended with infinite wisdom, as well as misery, by the powers of the two natures united in one person.
Here lies the foundation of the church. The foundation of the whole old creation was laid in an act of absolute sovereign power. Hereby God “hanged the earth upon nothing.” But the foundation of the church is on this mysterious, immovable rock, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God;” — on the most intimate conjunction of the two natures, the divine and human, in themselves infinitely distant, in the same person.
We may name one place wherein it is gloriously represented unto us, Isa. ix. 6, “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” Here must the whole church fall down and worship the Author of this wonderful contrivance; and, captivating their understandings unto the obedience of faith, humbly adore what they cannot comprehend.
This was obscurely represented unto the church of old, Exod. iii. 2–6, “And the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush; and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet; for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham,” &c.
This fire was a type or declaration of the presence of God in the person of the Son. For with respect unto the Father he is called an Angel, the Angel of the covenant; but absolutely in himself, he was Jehovah, the “God of Abraham,” &c. And of his presence the fire was a proper representation. For in his nature he is as a “consuming fire;” and his present work was the delivery of the church out of a fiery trial. This fire placed itself in a bush, where it burned; but the bush was not consumed. And although the continuance of the fire in the bush was but for a short season, a present appearance, yet thence was God said to dwell in the bush: “The good-will of him that dwelt in the bush,” Deut. xxxiii. 16. And this is so spoken, because the being of the fire in the bush for a season was a type of him in whom “the fulness of the Godhead dwelt bodily,” and that for ever, Col. ii. 9, — of him who was “made flesh, and dwelt among us,” John i. 14. The eternal fire of the divine nature dwells in the bush of our frail nature, yet is it not consumed thereby. God thus dwells in this bush, with all his good-will towards sinners.