of redemption through His blood, we must do the same. Whenever we invite and urge sinners to turn to God, and propose His mercy in Christ Jesus as the attractive motive, we can only adopt a like course. Whenever we raise the drooping penitent with the assurance of the divine acceptance, we have no other topic to present. Whenever we guard against superstitions, willworship, and mediation of saints and angels, we use the same conclusive arguments.

In fact, the whole of sound theology, whether systematic or popular, is impregnated with the one capital doctrine, that "we are accounted righteous before God, only for the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ by faith, and not for our own works and deservings."

18. Over statements should, of course, be avoided on this great topic, as on every other: enthusiastic, hasty, inadequate views are always ineffective, and often dangerous. This is not the only doctrine of the Gospel. There are many others--many to prepare for it-many to accompany it-many to follow it. There is also the whole system of Christian Duties and Morals to be enforced. The nearer we can keep to the exact proportion and bearing of inspired Scripture on this, as on all other subjects of religion, the better. As to justification, therefore, the way in which the apostles state the doctrine-the occasion-the persons addressed the consequences deduced-the frequency—are all to be carefully examined and accurately followed.

19. To assert, for instance, the doctrine of justification by faith, without clearly showing, as the Scriptures do, that it is to the penitent who is sincerely striving to turn to God, that you address yourself; or without showing that it is with a lively faith that it is to be received; or without showing that faith, though, as it respects Christ, it relies alone on his merits, yet is in other views the principle of all good works; or without showing that justification is the motive to all those good works, by which, indeed, a living may be distinguished from a dead faith, as certainly as a tree is discerned by its fruits—if we assert justi

fication without these explications, we undoubtedly inculcate a most unscriptural dogma, and not the Gospel of Christ—we fall, in fact, into the awful gulf of Antinomianism, whether intentionally or not.

19. But the scriptural doctrine of justification itself, duly and in its proper place and time set before the broken-hearted penitent, as the ground of his acceptance before God, to be received by a lively, humble, affectionate faith, and followed by the works of sanctification as its necessary fruit, is a "true and wholesome doctrine, and very full of comfort," contributing equally to the glory of God, the consolation of the penitent, and the interests of holiness.*

LECTURE VII.

GLORY OF CHRIST IN HIS DIVINE AND MEDIATORIAL CHARACTER.

COL. i. 15-17.

THE apostle, in the passage we have lately considered, verses 12-14, closed the account of the distinguishing benefits of Christ's salvation, by stating that we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins.

Lest, however, the Colossians should doubt the full efficacy of Christ's blood for this end, unless "will-worship" and the mediation of " angels" were added, he proceeds in the verses before us to give

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• The substance of this note, except where additions have been made, appeared in an appendix to my Charge of 1842-3.

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the most sublime descriptions of the glory of Christ in his divine and mediatorial character which is to be found in any part of Scripture, in order to show them the infinite merit of his one sacrifice upon the cross, and the vanity of all pretended additions to it.

The apostle speaks, first, of Christ in his divine nature; and, then, in his works of creation and providence, in proof of it; and, lastly, as Mediator to the church, founded on both.

14. Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature.

1. Thus the apostle describes our Lord's divine nature in itself, of which some rays of glory burst forth in his incarnation-for St. Paul seems to have an eye both to what our Lord is in himself, and what he became to us.

He is in himself the image, the representation, the exact resemblance of the invisible God; and being such, he manifested and declared him to men. He is the first-born of-born before-every creature, or the first-born of the whole creation by an eternal Heb. i. 2. generation, and "appointed" as such, " heir of all things;" as the first-born of his father was under the Jewish law.

The word image is used in two senses in Scripture, as it is still in our ordinary language. It sometimes means any resemblance, slight or not, of another person or thing, according to the nature of

the subject spoken of. So Adam was created " in the image of God," not as fully resembling God, but as bearing some faint likeness to him in "righteousness and true holiness."

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In a yet slighter sense, "the man" is said to be "the image and glory of God," on account of the woman's conjugal subjection to him. And so our Lord's question to the Jews with regard to the money current in Judea, " Whose image and superscription is this?" referred to the very imperfect resemblance to Cæsar impressed upon the coin. And, in contradistinction to this, the apostle contrasts the word, in a higher and stricter sense, with these slight adumbrations, when he says that the "law had a Heb. x. 1. shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things."

In this other and strictest sense we speak of a son being the image of his father, and a royal prince of the king whom he is to succeed. In these cases, we perfectly understand that, not a faint likeness merely, but one involving the very nature and qualities of the father, all the fullness of being, a soul, a body, a life, faculties, all the counterpart of his father is intended. And so the royal prince succeeding to his father's throne, as Solomon to David's. Thus" Adam begat Seth in his own likeness, after Gen. v. 2. his image," that is, Seth had a nature precisely the same in all things as Adam.*

When our Lord, then, is called here the image of

* Daillé in loc.

2 Cor. iv. 4,

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God, we must gather the meaning from the nature of our Lord, who is the subject of the description, the manner in which the words are introduced, and the kind of proofs, if there be any, adduced by the sacred writer to support his argument.

As Christ, then, is the consubstantial, natural, and co-equal Son of God, and has the same nature, the same qualities, perfections, and power, so that "whatsoever we believe of the glory of the Father, that we believe of the Son, without any difference or inequality;" and as the words are introduced to prove the infinite virtue of his sacrifice on the cross; and as the context ascribes to him all the divine prerogatives of creative and conserving power, in proof of his being what the words, image of God and the first-born of every creature, import, we can have no difficulty in understanding the passage. teaches us that Christ the uncreated Word and Wisdom of the Father, is his perfect image and resemblance, his exact counterpart; possessing all his glory, attributes, perfections, and powers, as the natural and only-begotten Son of God.

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Thus our apostle speaks in another place of "Satan's blinding the minds of men, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them"-" and give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face"-the person-" of Jesus Christ." "of Jesus Christ." The meaning of the word is clear-Christ is in the highest and strictest sense the image of God.