Meditations and Discourses on the Glory of Christ

1. IN the View which we have here of the Glory of Christ by Faith, we gather things as it were one by one, in several parts and parcels out of the Scripture, and comparing them together in our Minds, they become the Object of our present Sight, which is our spiritual comprehension of the things themselves. We have no proposal of the Glory of Christ unto us by Vision or illustrious appearance of his Person, as Isaiah had of old, Chap. 6. 1, 2, 3, 4. or as John had in the Revelation, Chap. 1. vers. 13, 14, 15, 16. We need it not, it would be of no advantage unto us. For as unto the assurance of our Faith, we have a word of prophecy more useful unto us, than a Voice from Heaven, 2 Pet. 1. 17, 18, 19. And of those who received such Visions, tho of eminent use unto the Church; yet as unto themselves, one of them cried out, Woe is me, I am undone; and the other fell as dead at his feet. We are not able in this life to bear such glorious Representations of him, unto our Edification.

1. IN the View which we have here of the Glory of Christ by Faith, we gather things as it were one by one, in several parts and parcels out of the Scripture, and comparing them together in our Minds, they become the Object of our present Sight, which is our spiritual comprehension of the things themselves. We have no proposal of the Glory of Christ unto us by Vision or illustrious appearance of his Person, as Isaiah had of old, Chap. 6. 1, 2, 3, 4. or as John had in the Revelation, Chap. 1. vers. 13, 14, 15, 16. We need it not, it would be of no advantage unto us. For as unto the assurance of our Faith, we have a word of prophesie more useful unto us, than a Voice from Heaven, 2 Pet. 1. 17, 18, 19. And of those who received such Visions, tho of eminent use unto the Church; yet as unto themselves, one of them cryed out, Wo is me, I am undone; and the other fell as dead at his feet. We are not able in this life to bear such glorious Representations of him, unto our Edification.

AND as we have no such external proposals of his Glory unto us in Visions, so neither have we any New Revelations of him, by immediate inspiration. We can see nothing of it, know nothing of it, but what is proposed unto us in the Scripture, and that as it is proposed. Nor doth the Scripture it self in any one place, make an entire proposal of the Glory of Christ, with all that belongs unto it; nor is it capable of so doing; nor can there be any such Representation of it, unto our capacity on this side Heaven. If all the Light of the Heavenly Luminaries had been contracted into one, it would have been destructive, not useful to our sight; But being by Divine Wisdom distributed into Sun, Moon and Stars, each giving out his own Proportion, it is suited to declare the Glory of God, and to enlighten the World: So if the whole Revelation of the Glory of Christ, and all that belongs unto it, had been committed into one series and contexture of Words, it would have overwhelmed our Minds, rather than enlightened us. Wherefore God hath distributed the Light of it through the whole Firmament of the Books of the Old and New Testament, whence it communicates it self, by various parts and degrees unto the proper use of the Church. In one place we have a description of his Person, and the Glory of it; sometimes in words plain and proper, and sometimes in great variety of Allegories, conveying an heavenly Sense of things unto the Minds of them that do believe; In others of his Love and Condescension in his Office, and his Glory therein. His Humiliation, Exaltation and Power, are in like manner in sundry places represented unto us. And as one Star differeth from another in Glory; so it was one way, whereby God represented the Glory of Christ, in Types and Shadows under the Old Testament, and another wherein it is declared in the New. Illustrious Testimonies upon all these things are planted up and down in the Scripture, which we may collect as choice flowers in the Paradise of God, for the Object of our Faith and Sight thereby.