Thirdly The connection of the passage is altogether in its favour. The phraseology is that of the Apostle John; so that if the words are not his, it must have been the most successful imitation of him that can be imagined. As it stands in our translation, there is evidently a gradation of ideas, forming a kind of climax of witnesses; namely, that of the three in heaven, of the three on earth, and the testimony which a believer has within himself. To leave out the first, were to weaken the passage and destroy its beauty. Besides, it is not the omission of the seventh verse only that is necessary, to make any thing like sense of the passage. The words on earth, in the eighth verse, must also be left out, if not the whole of the ninth verse, in which the witness of God is supposed to have been introduced; but which, if the seventh verse be left out had not been introduced. Those who are now for newmodelling the passage, leave out some of these, but not all; nor can they prove that those words which they do leave out were uniformly left out of even those copies in which the seventh verse is omitted. As the Father is allowed, on all hands to be a divine person, whatever proves the divinity and personality of the Son, proves a plurality of divine persons in the Godhead. I need not adduce the evidences of this truth: the sacred scriptures are full of them. Divine perfections are ordinarily ascribed to him, and divine worship is paid to him, both by angels and men. If Jesus Christ is not God, equal with the Father, Christianity must have tended to establish a system of idolatry, more dangerous, as being more plausible, than that which it came to destroy. The union of the divine and human natures, in the person of Christ is a subject on which the sacred writers delight to dwell; and so should we, for herein is the glory of the gospel. Unto us a child is born; and his name shall be called the mighty God. He was born in Bethlehem; yet his goings forth were from of old, from everlasting. He was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power. Of whom AS CONCerning the FLESH Christ came, who is OVER ALL GOD BLESSED FOR EVER, Amen. In his original nature, he is described as incapable of death, and as taking flesh and blood upon him to qualify himself for enduring it. Heb. ii. 14. He was the Son of God, yet touched with a feel ing of our infirmities; the root and the offspring of David. The sacred scriptures lay great stress on what Christ was antecedently to his assumption of human nature, and of the official character of a Mediator and Saviour. The Word was with God, and the Word was God.-He who wAS RICH, for our sakes became poor, that we through his poverty might be made rich. Who BEING the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, &c.—Who BEING in the form of God, thought it not robbery, or usurpation, to be equal with God; but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. If divine personality be not essential to Deity, distinct from all office capacity, and antecedent to it, what meaning is there in this language? An economical Trinity, or that which would not have been, but for the economy of redemption, is not the Trinity of the scriptures. It is not a Trinity of divine persons, but merely of offices personified; whereas Christ is distinguished from the Father, as the express image or character of his person, while yet in his pre-incar nate state. The sacred scriptures lay great stress on the character of Christ, as the Son of God. It was this that formed the first link in the Christian profession, and was reckoned to draw after it the whole chain of evangelical truth. I believe that Jesus Chist is the Son of God. From this rises the great love of God in the gift of him : God so loved the world as to give his ONLY-BEGOTTEN SON. The condescension of his obedience: Though he was a son, yet learned he obedience. The efficacy of his blood: The blood of Jesus Christ HIS SON cleanseth us from all sin. The dignity of his priesthood: We have a GREAT High Priest, Jesus the SON OF GOD. The greatness of the sin of unbelief: He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed on the name of THE ONLY-BEGOTTEN SON OF GOD. The greatness of the sin of apostaey: Who have trodden under foot THE SON OF GOD. The incarnation resurrection, and exaltation, of Christ declared, but did not constitute him the Son of God; nor did any of his offices, to all which his Sonship was antecedent. God sent his Son into the world. This implies that he was his Son antecedently to his being sent, as much as Christ's sending his disciples implies that they were his disciples before he sent them. The same may be said of the Son of God being made of a woman, made under the law. These terms no more express that which rendered him a Son, than his being made flesh expresses that which rendered him the Word. The Son of God was manifested to destroy the works of the devil; he must therefore have been the Son of God antecedently to his being manifested in the flesh. I have heard it asserted that "Eternal generation is eternal nonsense." But whence does this appear? Does it follow, that because a Son among men is inferior and posterior to his father, that it must be so with the Son of God? If so, why should his saying that God was his own Father be considered as making himself equal with God? Of the only-begotten Son it is not said he was, or will be, but he is in the bosom of the Father; denoting the eternity and immutability of his character. There never was a point in duration in which God was without his Son: he rejoiced always before him. Bold assertions are not to be placed in opposition to revealed truth. In Christ's being called the Son of God there may be, for the assistance of our low conceptions, some reference to sonship among men; but not sufficient to warrant us to reason from the one to the other. The sacred scriptures often ascribe the miracles of Christ, his sustaining the load of his sufferings, and his resurrection from the dead, to the power of the Father, or of the Holy Spirit, rather than to his own divinity. I have read in human writings," But the divinity within supported him to bear." But I never met with such an idea in the sacred scriptures. They represent the Father as upholding his servant, his elect in whom his soul delighted and as sending his angel to strengthen him in the conflict. While acting as the Father's servant, there was a fitness in his being supported by him, as well as his being in all things obedient to his will. But when the value, virtue, or efficacy of what he did and suffered, are touched upon, they are never ascribed either to the Father, or the Holy Spirit, but to himself, Such is the idea suggested by those fore-quoted passages. Who BEING the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had BY HIMSELF purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high.-Ye are not redeemed by corruptible things, but by THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF CHRIST.-The blood of JESUS CHRIST HIS SON, cleanseth us from all sin. Much less is said in the sacred scriptures on the divinity and personality of the Holy Spirit, than on those of the Son. The Holy Spirit not having become incarnate, it might be less necessary to guard his honours, and to warn men against thinking meanly of him. All judgment was committed to the Son, because he was the Son of Man. Yet there is enough said against grieving the Spirit, blasphemy against him, lying against him, doing despite to him, and defiling his temples, to make us tremble. In the economy of redemption it is the office of the Holy Spirit, not to exhibit himself, but to take of the things of Christ, and show them to us. He is the great spring head of all the good that is in the world; but in producing it, he himself appears not. We are no otherwise conscious of its influences than by their effects. He is a wind which bloweth where it listeth: we hear the sound, and feel the effects; but know nothing more of it. : The Holy Spirit is not the grand object of ministerial exhibition; but Christ, in his person, work, and offices. When Philip went down to Samaria, it was not to preach God the Holy Spirit unto them, but to preach Christ unto them. While this was done, the Holy Spirit gave testimony to the word of his grace, and rendered it effectual. The more sensible we are, both as ministers and Christians, of our entire dependence on the Holy Spirit's influences, the better but if we make them the grand theme of our ministry, we shall do that which he himself avoids, and so shall counteract his operations. The attempts to reduce the Holy Spirit to a mere property, or energy of the Deity arise from much the same source as the attempts to prove the inferiority and posteriority of Christ as the Son of God; namely, reasoning from things human to things divine. The Spirit of God is compared to the spirit of man; aud, as the latter is not a person distinguishable from man, so it has been said, the former cannot be a person distinguishable from God the Father. But the design of the Apostle, in 1 Cor. ii. 11. was not to represent the Spirit of God as resefnbling the spirit of man, in respect of his subsistence, but of his VOL IV. 40 |