Looking unto Jesus a view of the everlasting gospel, or, the souls eying of…

7. Who is the head both as undertaker, and purchaser, and treasurer upon whom this Covenant is established?¹ I answer, Christ, and none but Christ. All the promises of God in him are Yea, and Amen, unto the glory of God by us. This was very darkly held forth in the first manifestation of the Covenant to Adam, but now in this second breaking forth of it, it is very fully expressed and often repeated; thus Gen. 12.3.² in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed; and Gen. 18.18.³ all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in Abraham, and Gen, 22.18.⁴ in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. In comparing these texts we have a clear understanding thereof; in thee, in Abraham shall all the families, and nations of the earth be blessed; but lest Abraham himself should be thought author of this universal blessing, therefore is the explication, in thee, (i.) in thy seed; ⁵and this seed, saith the Apostle very expressly, is Jesus Christ; now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made; he saith not, and to seeds, as of many, but as of one, and to thy seed which is Christ. So then here is the sense; out of thy posterity shall spring the Messiah, by whom not only thy posterity, but all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. You may remember in the first promise Christ was called the seed of the woman; but now the seed of Abraham; Christ was the Son of Eve, or (if you will) the Son of Mary, and so the seed of the woman; and Mary was a daughter of Abraham, and so Christ, and Mary, and all upwards were of the seed of Abraham. But where shall we find mention of the passion of Christ in this expressure of his Covenant to Abraham? in the first manifestation it was included in that phrase of bruising his heel, and surely this is essential to the covenant of grace in any overture of it: some answer that this is thrice put on in the passage of this covenant with Abraham: