What concerns the glory of Christ in the mission of the Holy Ghost unto the church, with all the divine truths that are branched from it, I have at large declared in my discourse concerning the whole dispensation of the Holy Spirit. Here, therefore, it must have no place amongst those many other things which offer themselves unto our contemplation as part of this glory, or intimately belonging thereunto. I shall insist briefly on three only, which cannot be reduced directly unto the former heads.
And the first of these is, — That intimate conjunction that is between Christ and the church; whence it is just and equal in the sight of God, according unto the rules of his eternal righteousness, that what he did and suffered in the discharge of his office, should be esteemed, reckoned, and imputed unto us, as unto all the fruits and benefits of it, as if we had done and suffered the same things ourselves. For this conjunction of his with us was an act of his own mind and will, wherein he is ineffably glorious.
The enemies of the glory of Christ and of his cross do take this for granted, that there ought to be such a conjunction between the guilty person and him that suffers for him, as that in him the guilty person may be said, in some sense, to undergo the punishment himself. But then they affirm, on the other hand, that there was no such conjunction between Christ and sinners, — none at all; but that he was a man, as they were men; and otherwise, that he was at the greatest distance from them all as it is possible for one man to be from another, Socin. de Servat. lib. iii. cap. 3. The falseness of this latter assertion, and the gross ignorance of the Scripture, under a pretence of subtlety, in them that make it, will evidently appear in our ensuing Discourse.
The apostle tells us, 1 Peter ii. 24, that in “his own self he bare our sins in his own body on the tree;” and, chap. iii. 18, that he “suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.” But this seems somewhat strange unto reason. Where is the justice, where is the equity, that the just should suffer for the unjust? Where is divine righteousness herein? For it was an act of God: “The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all,” Isa. liii. 6. The equity hereof, with the grounds of it, must be here a little inquired into.
First of all, it is certain that all the elect, the whole church of God, fell in Adam under the curse due to the transgression of the law. It is so also, that in this curse death, both temporal and eternal, was contained. This curse none could undergo and be saved. Nor was it consistent with the righteousness, or holiness, or truth of God, that sin should go unpunished. Wherefore there was a necessity, upon a supposition of God’s decree to save his church, of a translation of punishment, — namely, from them who had deserved it, and could not bear it, unto one who had not deserved it, but could bear it.
A supposition of this translation of punishment by divine dispensation is the foundation of Christian religion, yea, of all supernatural revelation contained in the Scripture. This was first intimated in the first promise; and afterward explained and confirmed in all the institutions of the Old Testament. For although in the sacrifices of the law, there was a revival of the greatest and most fundamental principle of the law of nature, — namely, that God is to be worshipped with our best, — yet the principal end and use of them was to represent this translation of punishment from the offender unto another, who was to be a sacrifice in his stead.
The reasons of the equity hereof, and the unspeakable glory of Christ herein, is what we now inquire into. And I shall reduce what ought to be spoken hereunto to the ensuing heads:—
I. It is not contrary unto the nature of divine justice, it does not interfere with the principles of natural light in man, that in sundry cases some persons should suffer punishment for the sins and offences of others.
I shall at present give this assertion no other confirmation, but only that God has often done so, who will, who can, do no iniquity.
So he affirms that he will do, Exod. xx. 5, “Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation.” It is no exception of weight, that they also are sinners, continuing in their fathers’ sins; for the worst of sinners must not be dealt unjustly withal: but they must be so if they are punished for their fathers’ sins, and it be absolutely unlawful that any one should be punished for the sin of another.
So the church affirms, “Our fathers have sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities,” Lam. v. 7. And so it was; for in the Babylonish captivity God punished the sins of their forefathers, especially those committed in the days of Manasseh, 2 Kings xxiii. 26, 27; as afterward, in the final destruction of that church and nation, God punished in them the guilt of all bloody persecutions from the beginning of the world, Luke xi. 50, 51.