demption itself was subordinated to, and ordained for the glory of his person, as the end of all first and chiefly intended. I shall open it unto you thus. When God went about to choose Christ and men, he had all his plot before him in his understanding, through the vast omnisciency of that his understanding, (by divines called his Simple Intelligence,) which represented unto him, as this plot which his will pitched upon, so infinite more frames of worlds which he could have made; and all these he must be supposed to have had in his view at once, afore ever his will concluded all that was ordained to come to pass. Now, he having Christ, and the work of redemption, and us, and all thus before him, the question is, which of all other projects he had most in his eye, and which his will chiefly and primarily pitched upon to ordain it? I say, it was Christ and the glory of his person. God's chief end was not to bring Christ into the world for us, but us for Christ. He is worth all creatures. And God contrived all things that do fall out, and even redemption itself, for the setting forth of Christ's glory, more than our salvation. And the reasons for this are 1. (Out of ver. 6.) That Christ is God's beloved, and beloved for himself. And Deus unumquodque amat prout illud amabile est,-God loves every thing according to that degree of loveliness that is in it. Now Christ, or the second Person dwelling in that human nature, is per se amabilis, amiable for and of himself, and so is by God eligibilis per se, et propter se, of and for himself, as being an absolute good, which no other creature is. Whereas the work of redemption performed by Christ was not per se amabile, not loved or pitched upon for itself. But that which gives the loveliness unto it is a remedy for sin, as Rom. vi. 10, and in that respect the goodness of it is not absolute and intrinsical, but accidental; but the goodness, the loveliness that is in Christ's person, is absolute, and in itself such. And therefore, to have ordained it for this work only, had been to have lowered and debased it. 2. (Out of ver. 5.) The grace of the hypostatical union infinitely transcends that of adoption. The being God's natural Son far surpasseth our being his adopted sons, and therefore was in order ordained first. And therefore it is that, as the text also hath it, we are said to be predestinated unto adoption through him; that is, through him as God's natural Son, and that as supposed man. For unto him as God-man is it that we have this or any other relation. 3. Yea, thirdly, the work of redemption itself was ordained principally for Christ's glory, more than for our salvation. In Phil. ii. 7, the Apostle tells us, that Jesus Christ took upon him the form of a servant, and became obedient to the death (there is the work of redemption ;) 'wherefore,' saith he, 'God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name above every name,' &c. The plot of redemption therefore was subjected to the glory of Christ, and not Christ to it. 4. Now, fourthly, I might shew that then, when God took into his counsel and foreknowledge all his works projected by him, and this of Christ's assuming our nature as one among the rest, it was Christ's due that he should be the end of all, and that all God's decrees should be so framed as to make him the end of all, as well as God's own glory. So that in this there was that respect had unto Christ in those decrees of God, and he was so made the end of all therein, as no mere creature, no not the most eminent, could have been. There is a transcendency on Christ's part in this, that holdeth good in no creature. God might have made the angels and the elect, and not ordained the angels to serve the elect. That one creature is any way made the end of another to serve it, was a matter of liberty unto God, and depended merely upon his arbitrary institution. But if God will ordain Christ and a world, angels and men elect, or whatever else together with him, it is due that God's decrees about all these be so shaped and cast that all should serve him; for they must all be his inheritance, and so he must be set up as the end of them all. And this is such reason as no man can deny. But I have spoken to this upon Col. i. 16, 17. That which I shall further add to this point, and which is more proper to this place, is, whether Christ's glory was considered by God as a motive unto God in predestinating, as God's own glory was. I know orthodox divines do grant that Christ was set up as the end of all things predestinated, who yet dispute and doubt whether Christ was so considered of God in the act of predestinating as to be the motive to move God's will to predestinate us, and ordain all things else with Christ. For, say they, nothing out of God is or can be any motive to him to predestinate; for he purposeth all things in himself. For the resolution of this, I say— 1. That it is certain that the only determining or first moving cause that inclined God's will to predestinate both Christ and all things else with him, was his own will. He was so happy in himself, that he needed not that glory which is manifested in and by the union of the second Person with a human nature. 2. Yet, secondly, it is as certain that, so far as the manifestation of the glory of all or any of his attributes did or might move him to predestinate us, or ordain any of those works which he hath ordained, so far might the glory of the second Person move him to manifest it in and by this union, which was the highest way of glorifying him. In the sixth verse you read (and so in the thirteenth) that God predestinated us for the praise of the glory of his grace; that is there made an end that moved him. Now, what is the glory of his grace? It is but the glory of one of God's attributes. Suppose then you put instead of it, 'to the praise of the glory of his Son.' Is not a person of the Trinity as near to him as one of his attributes? Is not his Son as much to him as his grace? Certainly he is. And then he might as well aim at the highest glory of the second Person, which ariseth from this personal union, as at the glory of his grace in predestinating us. Thus, John v. 22, 23, 'God hath given all judgment to the Son, that all might honour the Son as they honour the Father.' He therefore took his Son's glory into consideration, as well as his own. And whereas it is objected, that nothing out of God can move God, it is true he predestinates all things by his own will and essence, even as he understands all things by his essence; so as that only was the cause that cast that determination in his will to the decreeing anything at all; yet so as, notwithstanding, the praise of the glory of his grace or power, &c., must be said to have moved him in the act: and this, although this praise of his glory be a thing out of himself,-as indeed it is, for it is that shine or result of his glory that arises out of all in the hearts of angels and men. But though this praise be not essentially God, yet it is God's; it is relatively his, and it is his peculiar. And so to say that it moves him in predestinating, is all one as to say that himself moves himself. For this praise relates to himself, and so he is said to make all things for himself, that is, for the praise of himself; which praise yet is not himself essentially, but his relatively. Now, even so the glory of the second Person, to be manifested in the human nature through that hypostatical union, is a thing out of God. It is not the person of his Son, but is relatively his Son's; and so moves him in the same order that the praise of the glory of his grace did. Only, to prevent mistakes, take in these four cautions:: First, That take the human nature which was assumed, and that as in God's simple intelligence it came up before him, as all ours did, and it was not anything in that human nature that moved him to predestinate it, or any thing else for it. Nor was the glory of that human nature made the end in the act of predestinating; but it was the glory of the second Person only, which God saw might be more fully manifested in this personal union than any other way: that was it that moved him, and that was made the end of all. For otherwise the assuming of a human nature was as mere an act of grace as to predestinate any of us was. Yea, Christ might have assumed (take all things as they lay in a possibility before him) any human nature else unto that dignity, as well as that which he did assume. The second caution is, That much less were Christ's merits considered as any motive unto God. They are but actions which are means of Christ's glory, and so far less than the glory of his person, and so are to him but as God's works are to himself. It was therefore the glory of his person alone that can, in the business we now speak of, be any way called a motive. And that, thirdly, not unto the act, but in the act; for as for the act itself, God's will cast it beyond the force of the simple consideration of any such extrinsical glory that could arise unto him or any of the three Persons. Nothing without himself raised up that will in him; only, inter prædestinandum, in the act of predestinating, he set up this glory of the three Persons as the end for which he contrived and ordained all things: which must needs be; for if the terminus, or purpose of his will, was works without himself, then the encouraging motive to those works is suitably short of glory, which ariseth to him out of these. And, fourthly, That Christ and his glory was set up as the end, is not to be understood as if God by one single act or decree did first predestinate Christ and his glory, and then by a new and distinct act chose us for him. But, that God having his whole platform, both about him and us, in one entire view before him, predestinated all by one entire act; yet so as in predestinating us, he was moved by the glory which Christ should have in us, whom he predestinated together with us, as both his end in predestinating us, and our end also; and accordingly did mould this whole contrivement so as we and all things else might most advance the glory of Jesus Christ, as was his due. SERMON VIL According to the good pleasure of his will; to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.-VER. 5, 6. I COME to those other two causes mentioned in the text; as 1. The efficient and principal cause that cast it; and that is merely the 'good pleasure of his will.' And, 2. here is another motive, besides the glory of Christ before-mentioned; and that is, 'the praise of the glory of God's grace.' 'According to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace.' The one is mentioned first, as that which did only cast the act, and move God to predestinate; the other, as that which yet moved him in the act itself. Now, for the explication of both these in general, you may thus conceive the difference between them. God, blessed for ever, deliberating, as it were, with himself whether he should make any creature or no, whether he should decree any children unto himself, or his Son to take human nature; that which cast the matter was merely the good pleasure of his will. He might have been blessed for ever without this; he needed not have cared to make so much as one creature, nor to ordain the second Person's assumption of a human nature to glorify him. He needed not that external praise of the glory of his grace that ariseth from us. He was glorious enough without all this. What cast it then? Nothing but the good pleasure of his will. Here is God's prerogative and blessedness. And the reason why nothing but God's own will could move him to it is, because all that the creature can be to him, or do for him, falleth short of him, and of the glory due unto him. Neh. ix. 5, 'Bless the Lord your God: blessed be his glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise.' God is above all blessing and praise; for him, therefore, to aim at the praise of his grace, this was not motive sufficient to determine his will simply to do it. It was his own will that merely cast it, only it being determined to predestinate creatures, it propounded to itself the praise of the glory of God's grace, wisdom, and other his attributes; and so they move him in predestinating, though not to predestinate. More particularly, for the first, the efficient, determining cause of predestination. If you observe it, it is not only put upon God's will, but upon the 'good pleasure of his will;' so saith the text. And this also is to be confined only to that part of his decrees of election, and predestinating men unto salvation; so as, between those decrees and all other there is this difference, that when other things, and making of other creatures are spoken of, the decrees about them are only put upon his will; as Eph. i. 11, ‘He worketh all things according to the counsel of his own will '-barely 'his own will.' But when he comes to predestinate and to save poor creatures by Christ, there comes in the 'good pleasure of his will,' as the determining 'He predestinated us according to the good pleasure of his will, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ,—that is, this is the strength, the height cause. of his whole will; this is the chief pleasure of it, even to predestinate us for Christ. Piscator, upon Matt. xi. 26, where the same word is used that here we meet with, 'Father, I thank thee that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent ones, and revealed them to babes; even so, Father, it pleased thee, ὅτι οὕτως ἐγένετο εὐδοκία ἔμπροσθέν σου—therefore, says Piscator, reprobation is an act of God's good pleasure of his will, as well as election is. My answer to this is, first, that when he there thanks his Father, and says it was his good pleasure, this hath not relation so much unto God's reprobating others as to his revealing of those things unto these babes; only this his good pleasure towards them is set off by his hiding it from others whom he reprobateth. The like manner of speech we have in many other scriptures, both in the Old Testament and the New; as, Rom. vi. 17, when Paul says, 'God be thanked ye were the servants of sin, but now have obeyed,' &c., his thanking God hath no reference at all to their having been the servants of sin, simply as such considered, but unto their having been now converted, and so obeyed, &c. ; only, comparatively, the mercy of their conversion is set forth by their having been the servants of sin. So here, Christ gives thanks only for the converting of these babes, and not for the reprobating of any. Only he mentions their reprobation and rejection, as that which made this benefit the greater, and his good pleasure in shewing his free grace the more visible and apparent. But, secondly, whatever God willeth may in a general sense be called his good pleasure; for if it did not please him, he would not will it. But still it is not said there, as here it is, that it was the good pleasure of his will. The phrase there hath not that adjectum, that addition to it, that here it hath. The meaning whereof is, that of all the things that God willeth, this alone (comparatively) is his good pleasure. He is pleased with nothing that he willeth so as he is with this. It is true he damneth men, but he doth it as a judge that condemneth a malefactor with a kind of regret and displeasure. And this may be truly said of it, that it is a mixed action. God hath something in him that moves him to the contrary, for he loveth his creature; only other ends prevail. But when he cometh to save men, here is the good pleasure of his will; his whole heart is poured forth in this : Jer. xxxii. 41, 'I will assuredly establish them with my whole heart, and with my whole soul.' God, when he shews mercy, when he predestinates unto glory, he doth it with his whole heart; there is nothing in him to contradict it; here is no mixture in this, all that is in him agreeth with it. It is therefore not only according to his good-will, but it is the top and height of his will; the most pleasing thing unto him of all the things that he willeth. It is according to the good pleasure of his will.' Thus you have that which is the chief cause, which I call the determining cause-namely, the will of God, 'the good pleasure of his will;' that was it that caused him to predestinate. Now, let us come to the other, the end that moved God, even the praise of the glory of his grace.' And here, for explication, take notice of the difference between the glory of his grace,' and the 'praise of that glory.' This 'glory of his grace,' here spoken of, is that glorious attribute itself, which is God's essence, which was in itself glorious, and had continued so, though no creature had been predestinated. But the 'praise of that glory' is that holding forth of the glory of this grace, that men might praise it, and give glory to it. So, then, conceive thus of it. The Lord had grace in him, glorious grace; that was his essence. And that which moved him to predestinate us was, that this grace of his might be praised. This is the mean |