Page 202
SECT. IV. Of the Holiness of Christ's Life.
2. FOr the holiness of Christs life, the Apostle tells us, that by the obedience of one many shall be made righteous; here's the obedience of Christ, and its influence on us. 1. The obedience of Christ is that whereby he continued in all things written in the book of the Law to do them: Observe, Christ's life was a visible commentary on Gods Law, For proof, Think not that I am come to destroy the Law, or the Prophets (saith Christ) but to fulfil them. And, the Father hath not left me alone (saith Christ) for I do alwayes those things that please him. Hence Christ in Scripture is called Holy and Just, and the Holy One, Acts 2.27. The most Holy, Dan. 9.24. by his actual holiness Christ fulfilled in act every branch of the Law of God; he walked in all the Commandments of God; he performed perfectly both in thought, word, and deed whatsoever the Law of the Lord required.—I do not, cannot limit this obedience of Christ to this last year of his Ministry, for his whole life was a perpetual course of obedience, he was obedient unto death, saith the Apostle 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, even until his death; and yet because we read most of his holy actings this year, and that this was the year wherein both his active and passive obedience did most eminently shine, and break forth; the year wherein he drew up all the dispersions of his precepts, and cast them into actions, as into sums total; therefore now I handle it, and I shall make it out by the passages following, only in this one year. As—
1. Now he discovered his charity in feeding the hungry, as at once five thousand men with five Loaves and two Fishes, John 6.9, 10, 11. and at another time four thousand men with seven Loaves, and a few small Fishes, Matth. 15.32.
2. Now he discovered his self-denial, and contempt of the World, in flying the of∣fers of a Kingdom; when the people were convinc'd that he was the Messiah from that miracle of feeding five thousand men with five Loaves, presently they would needs make him a King; but he that left his Fathers Kingdom for us, he fled from the offers of a Crown and Kingdom from them, as from an enemy, When Jesus perceived that they would come and take him by force, to make him a King, he departed again into a Mountain himself alone.
3. Now he discovered his mercy, in healing the Womans Daughter that had an unclean spirit; the Woman was a Greek, a Syrophenician by Nation; and in that respect Christ called her a Dog, and yet Christ gave her the desire of her soul: O the rich mercy of Christ, that he would admit a Dog to his Kingdom! O grace! O mercy! that Christ should black his fair hands in washing foul and defiled Dogs! what a motion of free mer∣cy was this, that Christ should lay his fair, spotless, and chast love, upon the black, de∣filed, and whorish souls? O what a favour, that Christ maketh the Leopard and Ethiopian white for Heaven?
4. Now he discovered his bounty, in giving the Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven to his Apostles, and to their Successors; this was a power which he had never communica∣ted before; it was a gift greater than the great Charter of Nature, and the Donative of the whole Creation. Indeed at first God gave unto man a dominion over the Fish of the Sea, and over the Fowl of the Air, and over the Cattel, and over the Earth; but till now Heaven it self was never subordinate to humane Ministration; herein was the acting of Christ's bounty, he gives unto his Ministers the Keys of Heaven, that Whatsoever they shall bind on Earth, shall be bound in Heaven, and whatsoever they shall loose on Earth, shall be loosed in Heaven.
5. Now he discovered his patience, in suffering all injuries; from hence forward to the death of Jesus, we must reckon his dayes like the Vigils, or Eves of his Passion; for now he began, and often did ingeminate those sad predictions of the usage he should shortly find, that he should be rejected of the Elders, and chief Priests, and Scribes, and suffer many things at Jerusalem, and be killed, and be raised up the third day, and in the mean time he suffers both in word and deed; they call him a Glutton, a Drunkard, a De∣ceiver, a Sinner, a Mad-Man, a Samaritan, and one possed with a Devil; sometimes they take up stones to stone him, and sometimes they lead him to an Hill, thinking to throw him down headlong, and all this he suffereth with patience; yea with much pati∣ence he possesseth his soul.