By J. C. Philpot
Chapter Four
from the book Meditations on the Sacred Humanity of Our Blessed Redeemer
Well might the apostle, as if in a burst of holy
admiration, cry aloud, as
with trumpet voice, that heaven and earth might
hear, "Great is the mystery
of godliness; God was manifest in the flesh."
#1Ti 3:16 A mystery indeed it
is, a great, a deep, an unfathomable mystery; for
who can rightly understand
how the divine Word, the eternal Son of God, was
made flesh, and dwelt among
us? "Who shall declare his generation?" #Isa 53:8; either that eternal
generation whereby he is the only-begotten Son of
God, or the generation of
his sacred humanity in the womb of the Virgin, when
the Holy Ghost came upon
her, and the power of the Highest overshadowed her?
These are the things
"which the angels desire to look into;"
which they cannot understand, but
reverently adore. And well may we imitate their
adoring admiration, not
attempting to understand, but believe, love, and
revere; for well has it
been said,
There faith believes, and love adores.
Nor, if rightly taught and spiritually led, shall we
find this a barren,
dry, or unprofitable subject. It is "the great
mystery of godliness;"
therefore all godliness is contained in it, and flows
out of it. There never
was, there never will or can be a truly godly
thought, feeling, or desire -
no, not one godly word or work, a godly heart or a
godly life which does not
arise out of, and is not sustained by, the great
mystery of an incarnate
God. There may be, indeed frequently is, as a legal
holiness, a fleshly
piety, a tithing of mint, anise, and cummin, and a
profusion of good works,
so called, independent of the grace that dwells in
the Lord the Lamb; but
godliness, as consisting in a new and heavenly
birth, with all its attendant
fruits and graces, can only flow from the fulness of
a covenant Head,
communicating life to the members of his mystical
body. And this covenant
Head, we know, is the Son of God, once manifest in
the flesh and now exalted
to the right hand of the Father. How clear on this
point, that all life is
in him and out of him, are his own words of grace
and truth: "Because I
live, ye shall live also;" "I am the way,
the truth, and the life; no man
cometh unto the Father but by me;" "Except
ye eat the flesh of the Son of
man and drink his blood, ye have no life in
you;" "I am the vine, ye are the
branches. He that abideth in me, and I in him, the
same bringeth forth much
fruit; for without me ye can do nothing."
If, then, our hearts, as touched with an unction
from above, are bent after
godliness, as a felt blessing; if, as made daily
more and more sensible of
our miserable emptiness and destitution, and the
drying up of all creature
springs of happiness and holiness, we long more and
more to realise the
inward possession of that promised well of water,
springing up into
everlasting life, we shall desire to look more and
more into this heavenly
mystery, and to have its transforming power and efficacy
more feelingly and
experimentally made known to our souls. "If any
man thirst," said the
blessed Lord, "let him come unto me and
drink;" and to show that not only
should he drink for his own soul's happiness, but
for the benefit of others,
he graciously added, "He that believeth on me,
as the scripture hath said,
out of his belly (or heart) shall flow rivers of
living water." #Joh 7:38
The whole of God's grace, mercy, and truth is laid
up in, is revealed
through, is manifested by, the Son of his love; for
"it pleased the Father
that in him should all fulness dwell;" #Col
1:19 and this as Immanuel, God
with us. Thus his sacred humanity, in union with his
Divine Person, is the
channel of communication through which all the love
and mercy of God flow
down to poor, guilty, miserable sinners, who believe
in the name of the
only-begotten Son of God.
If blessed then with faith in living exercise, we
may draw near and behold
the great mystery of godliness. To tread by faith
upon this holy ground is
to come "unto Mount Sion, and unto the city of
the living God, the heavenly
Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
to the general assembly
and church of the firstborn which are written in
heaven, and to God, the
Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made
perfect, and to Jesus, the
Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of
sprinkling, that speaketh
better things than the blood of Abel;" #Heb
12:22-24; for every blessing of
the new covenant, if we are but favouredwith a
living faith in an incarnate
God, is then experimentally as well as eternally
ours.
The last acts of the suffering obedience of our
adorable Redeemer are
couched in the words of the apostle, "And
became obedient unto death, even
the death of the cross." #Php 2:8 The death of
Christ was the fulfilment of
the purpose for which he came into the world, which
was, "to give himself
for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a
sweet-smelling savour." #Eph
5:2 "Now once in the end of the world hath he
appeared, to put away sin by
the sacrifice of himself." #Heb 9:26 The
sufferings, bloodshedding, and
death of the Lord Jesus Christ were a sacrifice
offered for sin, and are
therefore spoken of as a propitiation #Ro 3:25 1Jo
2:2 4:10 and an
atonement. #Ro 5:11 But in a sacrifice two things
are absolutely necessary:
1. That the blood of the victim should he shed, for
"without shedding of
blood is no remission:" "It is the blood
that maketh an atonement for the
soul;" #Le 17:11; and 2. That the victim should
die; for death being the
penalty of disobedience, #Ge 2:17 Eze 18:4, the
sacrifice offered as an
atonement for sin cannot be complete without the
death of the victim. In the
sacrifice of himself, offering up his sacred
humanity on the altar of his
Deity, the blessed Lord accomplished these two
essentials of a propitiatory
offering.
1. His blood was shed upon the cross - the actual
living blood of his sacred
humanity. It is therefore called "the precious
blood of Christ as of a lamb
without blemish and without spot," #1Pe 1:19,
and "his own blood." #Ac 20:28
Heb 9:12. It was precious as flowing from his sacred
humanity; precious, as
stamped with all the validity and merit of Deity;
precious in the sight of
God as a sweetsmelling savour; and precious in the
hearts of his people as
cleansing them from all sin. Sin is an evil so
dreadful, so hateful and
abhorrent to his righteous character, so provoking
to his justice and
holiness, that God could not pardon it unless an
atonement were made
adequate to its fearful magnitude. Thousands of rams
and ten thousands of
rivers of oil could not atone for sin. Did all men
consent to give their
firstborn for their transgression, the fruit of
their body for the sin of
their soul, #Mic 6:7, all could not suffice to
outweigh the magnitude or
sin. Lebanon is not sufficient for a burnt offering.
Nothing short of the
blood of the only-begotten Son of God could be an
atonement of sufficient
worth, of equivalent value.
2. But the death of the victim was also required. He
who freely and
voluntarily stood in the sinner's place must die in
his room, or the
substitution could not be effectual Here then, we
see the mystery of the
death of Jesus. There was no natural mortality {1}
in that sacred humanity
which the Lord assumed in the womb of the Virgin.
And yet he took a nature
which could die by a voluntary act. The whole of his
obedience in his state
of humiliation was voluntary. Therefore the last act
of it was as voluntary
as the first the death on the cross as much as the
assumption in the Virgin.
The Lord's own words are decisive here:
"Therefore doth my Father love me,
because I lay down my life that I may take it again.
No man taketh it from
me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay
it down, and I have
power to take it again. This commandment have I
received of my Father." #Joh
10:17,18.
The very merit of his obedience unto death whereby
it became capable of
being imputed for righteousness to the church of God
consisted mainly in two
things: the dignity of the obedient Sufferer and the
voluntariness of the
sacrifice as an act of obedience to the will of God.
Had our blessed Lord
not been God, and that as the eternal Son of God,
There would have been no
merit in his sufferings, bloodshedding, and death.
As the brightness of God'
s glory and the express image of his Person, as his
co-eternal Son he
thought it not robbery - no unhallowed, disallowable
claim, to be equal with
God; #Php 2:6; and therefore the very infinity of
Deity itself attached to
his words and works so as to stamp efficacious merit
upon them. It was not
because his humanity was perfect that it was
meritorious. Had his humanity
been as perfect as it was, if Deity were not in
conjunction with it, no
merit could have been attached to it any more than
there was merit in the
obedience of Adam, or in that of an angel. But being
God as well as man, the
merit of Deity was stamped upon all the acts of the
obedient suffering
humanity, so that, as we have sometimes said,
Godhead was in every drop of
his precious blood.
Again, if the life of the blessed Lord had been
violently taken away,
contrary to his will, where would have been the
obedience unto death? Had he
been killed, so to speak, by the cross - had died
because he could not help
dying, had his life been violently torn from him,
where would have been the
laying down of his life as the last act of his
voluntary obedience? What
power could man have had over him? Had he so willed,
he could have freed
himself from the hands of his enemies. Therefore he
said unto Pilate, "Thou
couldest have no power at all against me except it
were given thee from
above." #Joh 19:11 And again, "Thinkest
thou that I cannot pray to my
Father, and he shall presently give me more than
twelve legions of angels?"
#Mt 26:53 When, then, the band of men and officers
from the chief priests
came to take him with lanterns, and torches, and
weapons, he freely "went
forth" to yield himself up; but when he said,
"I am he," or rather, as the
words literally mean, "I AM," the glory of
his eternal Deity so flashed
forth, that "they went backward, and fell to
the ground." #Joh 18:3-6
Thus truly was he "brought as a lamb to the
slaughter, and as a sheep before
her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his
mouth." #Isa 53:7 What heart can
conceive, what tongue express what his holy soul
endured when "the Lord laid
upon him the iniquities of us all"? In the
garden of Gethsemane, what a load
of guilt, what a weight of sin, what an intolerable
burden of the wrath of
God did that sacred humanity endure, until the
pressure of sorrow and woe
forced the drops of blood to fall as sweat from his
brow. The human nature,
in its weakness recoiled, as it were, from the cup
of anguish put into his
hand. His body could scarce bear the load that
pressed him down; his soul,
under the waves and billows of God's wrath, sank in
deep mire where there
was no standing, and came into deep waters where the
floods overflowed him.
#Ps 69:1,2 And how could it be otherwise when that
sacred humanity was
enduring all the wrath of God, suffering the very
pangs of hell, and wading
in all the depths of guilt and terror? When the
blessed Lord was made sin
(or a sin-offering) for us, he endured in his holy
soul all the pangs of
distress, horror, alarm, misery, and guilt that the
elect would have felt in
hell for ever; and not only as any one of them would
have felt, but as the
collective whole would have experienced under the
outpouring of the
everlasting wrath of God. The anguish, the distress,
the darkness, the
condemnation, the shame, the guilt, the unutterable
horror, that any or all
of his quickened family have ever experienced under
a sense of God's wrath,
the curse of the law, and the terrors of hell, are
only faint, feeble
reflections of what the Lord felt in the garden and
on the cross; for there
were attendant circumstances in his case which are
not, and indeed cannot be
in theirs, and which made the distress and agony of
his holy soul, both in
nature and degree, such as none but he could feel or
know.
He as the eternal Son of God, who had lain in his
bosom before all worlds,
had known all the blessedness and happiness of the
love and favour of the
Father - his own Father, shining upon him, for he
was "by him as one brought
up with him, and was daily his delight, rejoicing
always before him." #Pr
8:30 When, then, instead of love he felt his
displeasure, instead of the
beams of his favour he experienced the frowns and
terrors of his wrath,
instead of the light of his countenance he tasted
the darkness and gloom of
desertion - what heart can conceive, what tongue
express the bitter anguish
which must have wrung the soul of our suffering
Surety under this agonising
experience? {2} A few drops of the wrath of God let
down into the conscience
of a child of God have made many a living soul cry
out, "While I suffer thy
terrors I am distracted; thy fierce wrath goeth over
me; thy terrors have
cut me off." #Ps 88:15,16 But what is all that
Job, Heman, Jeremiah, or
Jonah experienced, compared with the floods of
anguish and terror which all
but overwhelmed the soul of our blessed Lord? We
therefore read of him in
the garden, when the first pangs of his agony came
on, that he "began to be
sore amazed, and to be very heavy;" and this
made him say to his three
disciples, who were to be eye-witnesses of his
sufferings, #1Pe 5:1, "My
soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death."
#Mr 14:33,34 So great was
that load that his human nature must have sunk
beneath the weight his body
and soul been rent asunder, but for four sustaining
props: the power of his
Deity, for though that purposely did not display its
strength, it remained
in firm union with his sacred humanity; the help and
support of the Holy
Ghost sustaining his human nature under the load
laid upon it; the joy set
before him, which enabled him in the prospect to
endure the cross, despising
the shame; #Heb 12:2; and the strengthening of the
ministering angel sent
from heaven. #Lu 22:43 Thus supported and sustained,
our gracious Redeemer
sank not in the deep waters, but, as our great High
Priest, "offered up
prayers and supplications, with strong crying and
tears, unto him that was
able to save him from death, and was heard in that
he feared" #Heb 5:7 not
as some have foolishly thought and said, fearing the
miscarrying of his
undertaking, or that he should sink into hell, but
because he feared his
heavenly Father with the reverence of a Son
<>{3} for filial fear, with
every other grace, was in the heart of Jesus as his
treasure. #Isa 11:2,3
Let us ever bear in mind that the sufferings of the
holy soul of Jesus were
as real, that is, as really felt, as the sufferings
of his sacred body, and
a thousand times more intense and intolerable.
Though beyond description
painful and agonising, yet the sufferings of the
body were light indeed
compared with the sufferings of the soul. It is so
with the saints of God
themselves, when the Lord lays judgment to the line and righteousness to the
plummet in their conscience, and lets down a sense
of his anger and
displeasure into their soul. What is all bodily
suffering compared to a
sense of God's displeasure and the arrows of his
wrath sticking in the
conscience? So it was with our great High Priest,
when both as sacrificer
and sacrificed, alike priest and victim, he was
bound with the cords of love
and obedience to the horns of the altar. #Ps 118:27
Surely never was there
such a pang since the foundations of the earth were
laid as that which rent
and tore the soul of the Redeemer when the last drop
of agony was poured
into the already overflowing cup, and he cried out,
"My God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me?" Nature herself
sympathised with his sorrow, and was
moved at his cry, for the earth shook, the sun
withdrew his light, and the
graves yielded up their dead. Yet thus was
redemption's work accomplished,
sin atoned for and blotted out, the wrath of God
appeased, everlasting
righteousness brought in, and the church for ever
reconciled and saved.
When, then, the Lord had been fully baptized with
his baptism of suffering
and blood, when he had drunk the cup of sorrow and
anguish to its last
dregs, and had rendered all the obedience which the
law demanded and the
will of God required he cried out with a loud voice
that heaven and earth
might hear, "It is finished!" and then,
and not till then, he meekly bowed
his head, laid down his life, as the last act of his
voluntary, suffering
obedience, and gave up the ghost. Footnotes:
<>{1} Though we have in our
preceding chapters used the word
"immortal" as applicable to the sacred
humanity of the blessed Lord, we are well aware that
it is a term not fully
appropriate; for the word "immortal"
strickly means "not capable of death."
And is in this sense applied to the soul of man as
not only not dying with
the body, but not capable of dying.
In this sense, the humanity of the blessed Lord was
not immortal, for it
could and did die. If such a word were admissible,
"unmortal," or
"non-mortal," would be a preferable term -
denying that it was mortal, and
yet not asserting that it could not die. The main
difficulty arises from the
inherent defect of human language as applied to
heavenly mysteries. The mind
naturally contemplates only two states of existence:
1. What must
necessarily die; and, 2. What cannot possibly die.
The first it terms
"mortal," the second it calls,
"immortal." A third idea, that of a body
which does not necessarily die, and yet is capable
of dying, as being a
conception lying out of its reach, it has invented
no word properly to
express.
{2} Those who deny the eternal Sonship of Jesus rob
him of his grace as well
as of his glory, by diminishing his sufferings, and
thus really strip away
the greatness, and consequently much of the merit of
his sacrifice. It was
because he was God's own true and proper Son he so
deeply, so keenly felt
his wrathful displeasure. A Son by office, by mere
name - without any filial
relationship but a bare title which might have been any
other - could not
feel towards his adopted Father what the true, the
proper, the only-begotten
Son of God felt to his heavenly Father. One error
always lets in another,
and thus we see that the denial of the eternal
Sonship of Christ lowers and
disparages the greatness and consequently the merit
of the atonement. Let
the deniers of the eternal Sonship look to this.
{3} The margin reads, "for his piety." but
the truer and more literal
meaning is, "on account of his reverential
fear" "Had God in honour"-Luther
Please direct your comments to Mike
Krall.