V. OF THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST.

So fatal have the confequences of the fin of Adam been represented, that you have been told that nothing but the blood of God himfelf could reverse them; and therefore you have been taught to believe, that Jesus Christ, whofe proper title is the fon of man, as well as the fon of God, was not merely man, but very and eternal God himself; without confidering that, by thus making more Gods than one, you are guilty of a breach of the first and most important of all the commandments, which fays exprefsly, Thou shalt have no other Gods before me. Exod. xx. 3. But whatever fuch divines may fay, the apostle Paul fays, in direct contradiction to them, that to us there is but one God, the FATHER, of whom are all things; and one Lord, Jefus Chrift, by whom are all things, and we by him, 1 Cor. viii. 6. And again, after faying that we have one Lord, one faith, one baptifm, he adds, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. Eph. iv. 5. 6. The creed of all chriftians, therefore, ought to be, There is ONE GOD, and one mediator between God and men, the MAN Christ Jesus. 1 Tim. ii. 5.

The Father is frequently ftiled God, even with refpect to Chrift, as well as other beings. The God of our Lord Jefus Chrift, the Father of glory, give unto you, that ye may know the exceeding greatness of his power, which he wrought in Chrift, when he raised him from the dead, and fet him at his own right hand, &c. Eph. i.

17, &c.

17, &c. Chrift himself uses the fame language, 1 afcend unto my Father, and your Father, and unto my God, and your God. John xx. 17. My God, my God, why haft thou forsaken me? Matt. xxvii. 26.

Christ who was the image of the invifible God, and the first-born (or most excellent) of all his creatures, Col. i. 15. and in whom dwelt all the fulness of the godhead bodily, Col. ii. 9, acknowledged that his Father was greater than he. John xiv. 28. and indeed, upon all occafions, and in the clearest terms, he expreffed his dependence upon God his father, for all his power and glory; as if he had purposely intended to guard his disciples against forming too high an opinion of the dignity of their master. Verily I say unto you, the Son can do nothing of himself. John v. 19. I can of mine own felf do nothing. As I hear I judge, and my judgment is juft, because I feek not mine own will, but the will of the Father who sent me. v. 30. The words that I Speak unto you, I speak not of myself, and the Father who dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. xiv. 10.

I live by the Father. vi. 57. The Father hath given to the fon to have life in himself; and hath given him authority to execute judgment. v. 26, 27. All power is given unto me, in heaven and in earth. Matt. xxviii. 18. He even calls his Father the only true God. John xvii. 3. that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jefus Christ whom thou haft fent. It appears to me not to be in the power of language to exclude the idea of the divinity

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divinity of Chrift more exprefsly than by thefe folemn words.

Notwithstanding the divine communications with which our Lord was favoured, fome things are exprefsly faid to be withheld from him. For he himfelf, fpeaking of his fecond coming, fays, Mark xiiì. 32. But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father. In Matthew xxiv. 36. where the fame obfervation is repeated, it is, but my Father only.

The apostles, notwithstanding their attachment to their Lord and mafter, always preferve the idea of his fubordination to the Father, and confider all his honour and power as derived from him. from God the Father, honour and glory, 2

He received

Pet. i. 17. It pleafed the Father, that in him should all fulness dwell. Col. i. 19. The revelation of Jefus Chrift, which God gave unto him, Rev. i. 1.

is God's, 1 Cor. iii. 23. 1 Cor. xi. 3.

Ye are Chrift's, and Chrift The head of Chrift is God.

The reafon why Chrift was fo much distinguished by God the Father, is frequently and fully expreffed in the fcriptures, viz. his obedience to the will of God, and efpecially in his fubmitting to die for the benefit of mankind. Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life. John x. 17. He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name; that at the

name

name of Jefus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth; and that every tongue should confefs that Jefus Chrift is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Phil. ii. 8-11. Who for the joy that was fet before him, endured the cross, defpifing the shame, and is now fitten down at the right hand of God. Heb. xii. 2.

Our Lord fays, that he and his Father are one, John x. 30. but he sufficiently explains himself, when he prays that all his difciples may be one with him, and his Father, even as they are one, John xvii. 11. and he gives them the fame glory which God had given to him, ver. 22. Besides, at the very time that our Lord fays, that he and his Father are one, and in the very fentence preceding it, ver. 29, he fays, that his Father is greater than all. But how could the Father be greater than all, if there was any other, who was so much one with him, as to be, in all refpects, equal to him?

The mere term God is, indeed, fometimes ufed in a lower and inferior. sense in the scriptures, denoting dominion only; as when the Divine Being himself fays, that he will make Mofes a god to Pharaoḥ, Exod. vii. 1. but, furely, there can be no danger of our mistaking the sense of such phrases as these; or if it were poffible, our Lord himself has fufficiently guarded against any misconstruction of them when applied to himself, by the explanation he has given of them; informing us, that, if, in the language of fcripture, they are called gods to whom the word of God came, John x. 35.

(though, in fact, they were no other than mere men) he could not be guilty of blafphemy in calling himself only the fon of God. Now if Chrift had been confcious to himself that he was the true and very God, and that it was of the utmoft confequence to mankind that they should regard him in that light, this was certainly a proper time for him to have declared himself, and not to have put his hearers off with fuch logy as this.

apo

But even this power and dominion, to which Christ is advanced by God his Father, who gave all power into his hands, and who made him head over all things to his church, Eph. i. 22. this mediatorial kingdom of Chrift (as it is fometimes, and with fufficient propriety, termed) is not to be perpetual. For the apoftle Paul, fpeaking, no doubt, under immediate infpiration, exprefsly says, that when the end shall come, that God fhall have fubdued all things to his Son (in which he obferves, that he must be excepted who did fubdue all things unto him) he must deliver up the kingdom to God, even the FATHER, and be himself fubject to him who had put all things under him, that God may be all in all. 1 Cor. xv. 24, &c. Nay, he himfelf fays exprefsly, that he had not the difpofal of the highest offices of his kingdom, Matt. xx. 23. To fit on my right hand and on my left is not mine to give; but it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared of my Father.

So clear, my brethren, fo full, and fo exprefs, is the uniform teftimony of the scriptures to the great

doctrine