is death. James i. 15, Death is the wages of sin. Now death is threefold; the first, Spiritual; secondly, Corporal; thirdly, Eternal. First. Spiritual death is God's withdrawing or forsaking the soul, according to the dispensation it is under; mind that well: so God for saking of Adam and his, for sin, was this spi ritual death: so God passed sentence of death, or condemnation, upon Adam's soul and his; God forsook him and his; for God having passed the sentence of death, leaves Adam and his self-con Jin. you speak of, and the opposition you make arises not from necessity of nature, but the arbitrary choice of a capricious mind? The opposition arises from the nature of things; sin is not more contrary to the nature of God, than it is to the renewed nature, or rather the new nature of a christian. God hates sin with a perfect hatred, as sin,that which constitutes the christian, hates it as perfect in its kind;-light and darkness are not greater opposites than the evil and the good nature of Believers believers;" when they forsake his ways," he visits their sins with a rod, and their iniquities on 89 with stripes, yet his loving kindness will he not 32-33, take away from him, (with whom the covenant is made) nor cause his faithfulness to fail. In the support of this; then we have the evidence of ancient facts,---the testimony of the Holy Ghost --and the daily experience of our own minds. guilt. demned; so guilt possesses his soul, which being deprived of righteousness and holiness, with all impressions of sin, which are these, Eph. iv. 18, Having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their minds. ver. 19, Who being past feeling, have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness. And all this they were given up to, Rom. i. 24. 26; and one, and so, but the punishment of sin is from one degree to another. Secondly. One question more, and that is, How our old man is said to be crucified with Christ? If our actual sin be not part of the wages or punishment for Adam's disobedience, I say that all the after-acts of Adam's posterity was but heating the furnace; so every man shall have according to his works; so all the elect have heated the furnace hotter for their Lord, by their actual sin: so he bore sin and the wages of sin, or the punishment for sin, to the utmost; for had he not borne all their actual sin, he had not borne all the punishment for sin. As for these that have not the Son, look thou to it, for every act of sin thou committest heats the furnace of God's wrath hotter and hotter, Rom. ii. 4, 5, 1 Peter iii. 15. Thirdly. There is the punishment of sin, which is guilt, and this guilt is the punishment of of sin, so that sin furnishes itself by guilt, and is that worm that never dies: Isaiah Ixvi. 24, For their worm shall not die: Mark ix. 44, worm! Where their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched. By the way, have a care this worm doth not eat up thy manna; that is, thy confidence; Rev. ii. 17, compare with Exod. xvi. 24. Gen. iv. 13, And Cain said unto the Lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear. So that Christ bore sin, and the punishment for sin. I say, that Jesus Christ had the offence laid on him; that is, Adam's disobedience, and our actual sin the punishment for that disobedience, and the guilt of all, both original and actual, the punishment of sin to the utmost of God's wrath. Sa Christ dieth the deaths spiritual, coporeal, and eternal, as may be seen plainly in his agony. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Matt. xxvii. 46; there is his spiritual death. But more in order: the offence was laid on him, ́ that seizes his soul; Matt. xxvi. 38, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. So the punishment for offences, which are actual sins, or our evil lives, seizes his body; Luke xxii. 44, And his sweat were as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground; and so dies spiritually, having all, both the offence and the punishment laid on him, he must bear the guilt. So, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me, was the last death, and partly the last words for ought I know. These things considered, I state my doctrine, that Jesus Christ has had all the sin of his laid on him, in having that offence laid on him. For the clearing this point, let us consider that offence: For if that law given to Adam had all the Ten Commandments in it, as has been proved before, then the breach of that was the breach of them all; but the former is Let us consider that offence itself, ar rather the command for God's prohibition, or forbidding this fruit to be eaten; God must have some intent in it: first, in respect of the creatures secondly, in respect of himself. First. In respect of his creature, his signified Wil or revealed will was, that they should not eat upon pain of death; but his real intent was not so, for the event proves the contrary; for if his real intent in himself had been, that they should not have eaten, doubtless his intent had not been frustrated. Eph. i. 11; Rom. ix. 19, Who hath resisted his will? Now, thou shalt not eat, is the command; thou shalt die, is part of the thing to be believed. Now, the command is to one hederal, general head, respects both elect and reprobate; so that which happens to him, to all alike; so that Eve crediting the Devil, he discredited God; so we see that this fruit was not eaten without? unbelief. First, He did not believe God spake the truth: 1. Secondly, That God did not intend 18. him good in forbidding of him to eat; so here, were the origin of original sin; and being im-Origin! that was a lic. First. The serpent said, ye shall not surely die. So they did not believe they should die, and that was a lie, for they did die. Secondly. Ye shall not surely die; but God not stand; so God was frustrated of his purpose M 3 blasphemy? No; I 28. Hote shall |