Now the Apostle bringeth an Argument against indulgence in sin, notwithstanding Gods grace, Because we are dead to it, and then how can we live to it? Would it not be a monstrous, and an affrighting sight, to see dead men come out of their graves, to live and walk amongst us? Thus also it ought to be no less wonderful, yea terrible, to see a Christian give himself to any evil way. And that we are dead to sin, he proveth by our Baptism, concerning which he speaks admirable and sublime matter: So that if we consider what great things are here spoken of it, we may wonder to see, how cold and rare our meditations are about it; for he makes it to be that Sacrament, in the right use whereof▪ we put on Christ, yea that thereby we are engrafted and implanted into him: Hence ver. 5. he useth that word of being planted into him; a metaphor from the Husbandman, who by planting his Science into, another stock, doth thereby make it partake of the life or death of the Tree; if the Tree liveth, that liveth; if the Tree dieth, that dieth; so it is with us and Christ. By the phrase then is intended no more than our communion with, and interest in Christ, and that both in his death, and his resurrection: For you must know, that the Scripture doth not only make Christs death and resurrection to be the cause of the death of our sins, and of our spiritual resurrection to holiness, but also makes them types and resemblances of such things in us, That as Christ died in his passible body, so we should die to sin; and as Christ after his death did rise again to glory and immortality, thus we should rise out of sin, to walk in newness of life, and both these are signified in Baptism.
Now the Apostle bringeth an Argument against indulgence in sinne, notwithstanding Gods grace, Because we are dead to it, and then how can we live to it? Would it not be a monstrous, and an afrighting sight, to see dead men come out of their graves, to live and walk amongst us? Thus also it ought to be no less wonderfull, yea terrible, to see a Christian give himself to any evil way. And that we are dead to sinne, he proveth by our Baptism, concerning which he speaks admirable and sublime matter: So that if we consider what great things are here spoken of it, we may wonder to see, how cold and rare our meditations are about it; for he makes it to be that Sacrament, in the right use whereof▪ we put on Christ, yea that thereby we are ingraffed and implanted into him: Hence ver. 5. he useth that word of being planted into him; a metaphor from the Husbandman, who by planting his Science into, another stock, doth thereby make it partake of the life or death of the Tree; if the Tree liveth, that liveth; if the Tree dieth, that dieth; so it is with us and Christ. By the phrase then is intended no more than our communion with, and interest in Christ, and that both in his death, and his resurrection: For you must know, that the Scripture doth not only make Christs death and resurrection to be the cause of the death of our sins, and of our spiritual resurrection to holiness, but also makes them types and resemblances of such things in us, That as Christ died in his passible body, so we should die to sinne; and as Christ after his death did rise again to glory and immortality, thus we should rise out of sinne, to walk in newness of life, and both these are signified in Baptism.
