Moses his choice with his eye fixed upon Heaven, discovering the happy condition of…

CHAP. L. The Saints happiness in Communion with Christ.

Now the fifth particular in the reward of the Saints, is the communion that they shall have ¹with Jesus Christ, God and Man: there are divers things in which the happiness of the Saints consists in having communion with Christ, God and Man. It was one of Saint Augustine's three wishes, To see Christ in the flesh: It would be a great delight to you to see Christ in the flesh. Many make much of the Picture of Christ, and if they had it right, they would make more of it; but if Christ should come to any of your houses, as he did when he lived upon the Earth, in his mean condition, would it not greatly delight you? but when we come to enjoy communion with Christ in Heaven, it will be another manner of communion, then that upon Earth: We accounted the Apostles blessed men, that lived with Christ upon the Earth; what a blessed condition will it be, to live with Christ in Heaven? If there were such virtue in Christ upon Earth, that there came such virtue from the hem of his garment, what glory will there be in Christ, in his full glory? If Christ were so glorious when he was in his transfiguration, how glorious is he, being glorified before men and Angels eternally in Heaven, With the glory that he had with his Father, ²before the beginning of the World! If there was so much virtue in the Apostles of Christ, in regard of the reference they had to Christ, as from the shadow of Peter, and the Napkins that were taken from ⟨p. 580⟩Pauls body, there was such power as to heal diseases, what virtue must needs come from Christ, when we shall come to enjoy him, when we come to see Christ that was the author of all our good? We read of the poor Cripple, when he was healed by the two Disciples, he ran and catched hold on them, and was loth to go from them, who had been the instruments of so great good to him; but for the Saints to come and be with Christ, who hath been the instrument of so great good to them, as Christ hath been, what an infinite happiness will this be? we read of many that would go long journeys, to see those men that had any excellency in them; as some would go from the utmost parts of Greece to Rome, to see Livy, Themistocles: to see Christ then, in whom is so much excellency, will be glorious. And then to have communion with him: it is he in whom God the Father takes full satisfaction; surely he must be the full satisfaction of the Saints: