A53708:368
Meditations and Discourses on the Glory of Christ
Meditations and discourses on the glory of Christ, in his person, office, and grace with the differences between faith and sight applied unto the use of them that believe / by the late Reverend John Owen, D.D.
London: printed by B.A., 1691
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Chapter 9: The Glory of Christ in his intimate Conjunction with the Church.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
THESE are some of the Foundations of that Mystery of transmitting the sins of the Church as unto the guilt and punishment of them from the sinners themselves unto another every way innocent pure and righteous in himself, which is the Life, Soul and Centre of all Scripture Revelations. And herein is he exceedingly Glorious, and precious unto them that believe. No heart can conceive, no Tongue can express the Glory of Christ herein. Now because his Infinite Condescension and Love herein have been spoken to before, I shall here only instance its Greatness in some of its Effects.
THESE are some of the Foundations of that Mystery of transmitting the sins of the Church as unto the guilt and punishment of them from the sinners themselves unto another every way innocent pure and righteous in himself, which is the Life, Soul and Center of all Scripture Revelations. And herein is he exceedingly Glorious, and precious unto them that believe. No heart can conceive, no Tongue can express the Glory of Christ herein. Now because his Infinite Condescension and Love herein have been spoken to before, I shall here only instance its Greatness in some of its Effects.
1. IT shines forth in the Exaltation of the Righteousness of God in the forgiveness of sins. There is no more adequate conception of the Divine Nature, than that of Justice in Rule and Government. Hereunto it belongs to punish sin according unto its desert: And herein consisted the first actings of God as the Governor of the Rational Creation; They did so in the Eternal punishment ⟨p. 114⟩of the Angels that sinned, and the casting of Adam out of Paradise, an Emblem also of everlasting Ruin. Now all the Church, all the Elect of God are sinners: They were so in Adam; they have been and are so in themselves. What doth become the Justice of God to do thereon? Shall it dismiss them all unpunished? Where then is that Justice which spared not the Angels who sinned nor Adam at the first? Would this procedure have any consonancy thereunto, be reconcilable unto it? Wherefore the Establishment of the Righteousness of God on the one hand, and the forgiveness of sin on the other, seem so contradictory, as that many stumble and fall at it eternally, see