Hence an ancient translator renders here, I know that my kinsman, or he that is near to me liveth.' And such were under a special obligation to redeem, as appears, Ruth iii. 12. iv. 4, 5. where the case is set down between Boaz and the other kinsmen. Boaz was a kinsman and had a right to redeem, yet because there was a nearer kinsman, he would not meddle but upon his refusal. As if he had said, You have the first right, and may make use of your privilege if you please: "If thou wilt redeem it redeem it, but if thou wilt not redeem it, then tell me that I may know, for there is none to redeem it besides thee, and I am after thee." From this proceeding it is evident that redemption belonged to those that were near of kin, and first to the nearest. Jesus Christ is near to us, therefore pro perly and in a strict sense be is goel, our Redeemer, he is flesh of our flesh, and bone of our bone," he is one with Us. As we are the children of God by regeneration, so we are the brethren of Christ by adoption. "For both he that sanctifieth, and they that are sanctified, are all of one for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren," Heb. ii. 11. Christ and we are "all of one," that is, of one nature; we, and Christ, as man, are not only of one father, or efficient cause, which is God, but we are one of nature or material cause, which is flesh and blood. In which respect he is our Redeemer upon the strictest terms and laws of redemption: and in that strict sense, besides him there is no redeemer. For though God the Father in the Son by the Holy Spirit be indeed our Redeemer, yet properly and according to the signification of this word, Jesus Christ alone is our Redeemer; who taking our nature, and becoming our brother, had right to redeem us, even as being God in our nature, he had full power to redeem us. We are redeemed by the blood of Christ, Ephes. i. 7. "In whom we have redemp tion through his blood."

Job doth not only profess faith in a Redeemer, but in his Redeemer: "My Redeemer liveth;" every word in this confession is precious and weighty. Here he useth an appropriating word, yet he doth not engross the Redeemer to himself excluding others. Those pronouns, mine, thine, his, are words of love, and drop like honey-combs with sweetness of affection. Job's heart was carried out abundantly to Christ in love as well as in faith. The first work of faith is to believe that Christ is a Redeemer; the second is to rest and rely upon Christ as a Redeemer; the third is to see an interest in Christ as my Redeemer. Thus here,

my Redeemer shews that Job had much interest in and love to the Redeemer; his faith did not run upon generals, but was fixed, set down, and resolved to live and die by his living Redeemer.

"My Redeemer liveth."]-To live implies not only the present being, but the eternity of the Redeemer; as if he had said, though I am mortal and dying, as also you my friends are, yet "my Redeemer liveth;" he saith not, hath lived, or shall live, but he liveth: he speaks of the Redeemer's life, without any distinction of past or to come, he liveth. God is for ever I am; Christ as God liveth from eternity, Christ as man liveth to eternity. And as Christ God-man was "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," in the promise, and from eternity in the purpose and decree of God, so Christ as God-man lived from eternity in the purpose of God, and from the foundation of the world. in the promise. Christ is compared in the gospel to many things, to water, to bread, to a stone, to a way; yet every one of them hath the addition of life as he is compared to them. He is not called simply water, but living water; not simply bread, but living bread; so also, "a living stone, a living way, the tree of life," and a living Redeemer.

Observe, A believer may through grace arrive at the full assurance of his interest in Jesus Christ as his Redeemer.' Here are two words of assurance, I know, there is assurance; my Redeemer, there is assurance again. Faith acts upon a sure ground; it is bottomed on the knowledge of a sure word, not upon opinion, and it takes fast hold; it is not satisfied until it can say, 'The Redeemer is mine, and I am his, all is mine, and he is my all.'

We have this farther comfort in the life of Christ, that we live in him; for as Christ is "the life," John xiv. 6. so "he is our life," Col. iii. 4. our life is bound up in him. Christ is indeed "the bundle of life," I Sam. xxv. 29. in whom the lives of all believers are bound up. Hence (which is a spring of everlasting assurance and consolation) himself infers, John xiv. 19. "Because I live, ye shall live also." The life of saints is not in their hands, "but in Christ their head." And seeing the Spirit hath taught us in his word to say, that "he is our life," we may say, with holy reverence and in an humble dependence upon him, "that our life is as safe as his, as it is secured and hid in him.'

Though every believer doth not arrive at this clearness and full assurance of faith, to know that the Redeemer is

his; yet he that believes cannot but know that he upon whom his soul resteth, as a Redeemer, liveth. And therefore, though he doth not yet receive the sweetness of this comfort, "that he shall for ever live with Christ," yet he ought with his all to pay the tribute of his duty in living unto Christ.

"And that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth."-This latter day is understood by some of Christ's incarnation, and of his tabernacling and dwelling among us; but the Hebrew word signifies to rise up, to stand, which sets forth Christ's resurrection from the dead, and that he shall stand in his glorified human nature upon the earth in the morning of the resurrection; for he will come "to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe:" and as the word latter in the Hebrew is last, some suppose it to be a character of Christ, and open the words thus, He that is last shall stand upon the earth.' And here let it be observed, that the last is one of the titles of Christ, who is called "Alpha and Omega, the first and the last," Rev. i. 7. It is as great an honour to be called the last, as the first; Isai. xliv. 6. "Thus saith the Lord, the King of Israel, and the Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts, I am the first, and I am the last, and beside me there is no God:" first and last, alpha and omega, compre hend all. Alpha is the first, omega is the last letter of the Greek alphabet; these are letters of more eminent note than the rest, because being first and last, they inclose all the rest. How eminent then is Christ, who is himself both these letters! How great is he in whom the terms of greatest distance, first and last, meet and are united! so that Christ calling himself first and last, takes to himself absolute perfection, power, sovereignty, eternity, dignity, and divinity. He is the first, because before all beginning he was in the beginning with God, and from him all things received their beginning: "All things were created not only by him, but for him," Col. i. 16. He is also the last, because when we are blessed with him, we are at the highest or last of our attainments, we rest and have no more to seek when we have found him, for he brings us to the Father in whom, through himself the Son, we have eternal rest. Thus we may con. ceive Job's faith triumphing in his Redeemer, as the sum and comprehension of all things: He liveth as the first, and as the last shall stand upon the earth, or upon the dust.

These words shew Job's faith in the divine nature of the Redeemer, and that "in the latter day he shall stand on the

earth, that is, that he shall take flesh and be incarnate; there is Job's faith, that the Redeemer should assume our human nature, and so become "God with us." He could not have had a true faith in the Redeemer, unless he had believed this; he could not have called Christ his goel, or kinsman, in the former part of the verse, unless he had believed that he should stand upon the earth, as he expresseth it in the latter part. The Redeemer must be God, in order to satisfy; the Redeemer must be man, in order to suffer, and for a living Redeemer to stand upon the earth.

Ver. 26. "And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God."]-The bishops' translation is, Yet shall I see God in my flesh.' The word here rendered destroy, in the original signifies to diminish, or to crumble in the smallest aloms: which sets forth the strength and triumph of Job's faith in the resurrection of his body; that though death and the worms of the grave may crumble his body to the smallest dust, and scatter it as atoms before the sun, 66 yet in my flesh shall I see God." O the wonders and victories of a believer's faith over sin, death, hell, and the grave! See, O see, how triumphant faith rides in the chariots of salvation! for it is as though Job had said, Let sin, let satan, let death and the grave do their worst with me, it can never disappoint me, or destroy my hopes; I shall rise, I shall triumph," yet in my flesh, (that is, in my raised, immortal, and glorified flesh,) I shall see God;" these eyes, now feeble and weak, shall see and behold all the beauty, glory, and perfections of my incar nate God, as my Redeemer and my portion.' There is a twofold seeing: first, seeing with the eye of the body; secondly, seeing with the eye of the mind; a corporeal and an intel. lectual sight: both which may here be understood, according to the twofold acceptation of the word, "I shall see God." The word God may be taken, either, first, essentially for the divine nature, and then we must expound the word see in the latter sense, I shall see him with the eye of my mind, or intellectually. Secondly, the word God may be taken personally for Jesus Christ, the Mediator, who having two natures, the divine and human united in his person, or having assumed the human nature into the divine, is often called God: so that, "I shall see God," is this, I shall see Jesus Christ, God-man, who being glori fied in the body, shall be seen with bodily eyes. And so Job assures himself that he shall see God in the first

sense with the eye of the body; as if he had said, I shall have a glorified eye to see a glorified Saviour with.' From or in my flesh I shall see God; that is, my incarnate God, God in my nature and some have thought Job to be one of the saints that rose with Christ, and ascended to heaven with him.

The bodies of the saints in the resurrection morning shall be raised to life, and shall see God; for our whole business and our whole blessedness will be to see God. Job speaks as if there were nothing to be done in the next life, but only to see God; nothing to be had or enjoyed then, but only a sight of God; and indeed there shall be nothing else; I shall see God," saith he, that is enough for me, yea, that is all to me, Psalm xvi. 11. "In thy presence is fulness of joy;" that is, when I shall see and enjoy thee present: Matt. v. 8. "The pure in heart shall see God:" 2 Cor. xiii. 12. "Now we see through a glass darkly, then face to face;" that is, intuitively and directly, not reflectively or by effects; we shall see as we are seen, and know as we are known, according to the utmost comprehension which a creature is capable of; our vessels shall be as full as they can hold, and what can we have more? Yea, our happiness shall be, that we can have no more. Our hearts shall be so full of joy, and our heads so full of knowledge, that we shall desire no more. We see the world, and are not filled: "the eye, (saith Solomon) is not satisfied with seeing." But the sight of God" is satisfying and filling, that will not leave one empty space or corner in the soul. God is enough for us, and we shall certainly have enough when we see him as he is. That privilege is assured to the sons of God, 1 John iii. 2. We shall see him as he is." In this life the saints see God; the life of grace is the vision of God, as well as the life of glory: and though it be true, that here the saints do rather see what God is not, than what he is; yet it is true also, that here the saints see God" as he is," as those words may note a real seeing of him, though not a full seeing of him. Here we see God by faith: "We, (saith the apostle, 2 Cor. v. 7.) walk by faith, not by sight.'

Glorified saints shall see and ever behold the glories of the Godhead in the glorious body of Jesus Christ. For we shall see Christ in our nature glorified. Therefore some render the text, I shall see God in my flesh; that is, I shall see Christ sitting in glory, clothed with flesh, or in the likeness of man. "God sent his Son in the likeness