A SERMON: “In Thy name shall they rejoice all the day: and in Thy righteousness shall they be exalted.” (Psalm 89 : 16) by Rev. Ebenezer Erskine (June 4th, 1721)

The Psalmist, in the beginning of this Psalm, having run out at a great length in the praise and commendation of the God of Israel, he comes, from the 15th verse of the Psalm, to declare the happiness of His Israel, or of true believers, of whom Israel according to the flesh were a type. Now, God’s Israel are a happy people upon several accounts. 1. Because they are privileged to know the joyful sound, in the beginning of the 15th verse. The Gospel has a joyful sound; a sound of peace, a sound of life, a sound of liberty and salvation. You are all privileged to hear this sound with your bodily ears; but the great question is, If you do know it, understand it, and give faith’s entertainment to it? Alas, Isaiah’s lamentation may but too justly be continued, with respect to the greatest part of the hearers of the Gospel. Who hath believed our report? 2. God’s Israel are a happy people, because they walk in the light of His countenance, in the close of the 15th verse. They are privileged with the special intimations of His love, which puts more gladness in their hearts, than when corn, wine, and oil doth abound. 3. Whatever discouragement they may meet with from the world yet still they have ground of rejoicing in their God: In Thy Name shall they rejoice all the day; and, Thanks be unto God, says the Apostle, Who always causeth us to triumph in Christ. 4. Their happiness is evident from this, that they are dignified and exalted above others, by the immaculate robe of Surety’s righteousness; as you see in the words of my text, In Thy righteousness shall they be exalted.

In which words briefly we may notice, 1. The believer’s promotion; he is exalted. In the first Adam we were debased unto the lowest Hell, the crown having fallen from our heads: but in Christ, the second Adam, we are again exalted; yea, exalted as high as Heaven, for we sit together with Him in heavenly places, says the Apostle. This is an incredible paradox to a blind world, that the believer, who is sitting at this moment upon the dunghill of this earth, should at the same time be sitting in Heaven in Christ his glorious Head and Representative; and yet it is indisputably true, that we sit together with Him in heavenly places (Eph. 2: 6). Yea, in Him he rules the nations with a rod of iron, and triumphs over, and treadeth upon all the powers of Hell. 2. We have the ground of the believer’s preferment and exaltation; it is in Thy righteousness; it is not in any righteousness of his own: no; this he utterly disclaims, reckoning it but dung and loss, filthy rags, dogs meat: but it is in Thy righteousness; that is, the righteousness of God, as the Apostle calls it (Rom. 1: 17). The righteousness which is of God by faith (Phil. iii. 9). The righteousness of God is variously taken in Scripture. Sometimes for the infinite rectitude and equity of His nature (Psalm xi: 7). The righteous Lord loveth righteousness. Sometimes for His rectoral equity, or distributive justice, which He exerciseth in the government of the world, rewarding the good, and punishing evil-doers (Psalm xcvii. 2). Righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His Throne. Sometimes it is put for His veracity and faithfulness in accomplishing His Word of promise, or in executing His Word of threatening (Psalm 36: 5, 6). Thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds: Thy righteousness is like the great mountains. Sometimes it is put for the perfect righteousness which Christ the Son of God as our Surety and Mediator brought in by His obedience to the law, and death on the cross, for the justification of guilty sinners: and this, as I said, is frequently called the righteousness of God, and in this sense I understand it here in the text, In Thy righteousness shall they be exalted. The observation is much the same with the words themselves, namely, That in, or by the righteousness of Christ, believers are exalted. Or thus, Whatever honour or happiness believers are exalted to, the righteousness of Christ is the ground and foundation of it. It is all owing to the complete obedience, and meritorious death of the ever-blessed Surety. This is the foundation which God hath laid in Zion, upon which all our happiness in time and through eternity is built. I have not time now to adduce parallel texts of Scripture for the confirmation of this doctrine, neither can I stand upon a long prosecution of it, considering what great work you have before you through the day.

All I shall do, shall be only,

I. To offer a few propositions anent this righteousness, that you may understand both the nature and necessity of it.

II. Give you a few of its properties, to clear its excellency.

III. Speak a little of the believers’ exaltation by virtue of this righteousness.

IV. Apply.

I. For the first thing, to offer a few propositions anent this righteousness for clearing its nature and necessity.

1. Then, You would know, that God having made man a rational creature, capable of moral government, He gave him a law suited to his nature, by which he was to govern himself in the duties he owed to God his great Creator. This law was delivered to man in the form of a covenant, with a promise of life upon the condition of perfect obedience, and a threatening of death in case of disobedience (Gen. ii. 7). Thus stood matters between God and man in a state of innocence.

2. Adam, and all his posterity in him, and with him, having broken the covenant, are become liable to the curse and penalty of it; so that our salvation is become absolutely impossible, until justice be satisfied, and the honour of the broken law be repaired. The law and justice of God are very peremptory, and stand upon a full satisfaction and reparation, otherwise Heaven’s gates shall be shut, and eternally barred against man and all his posterity. The flaming sword of justice turns every way, to keep us from access unto the Paradise that is above.

3. While man in these circumstances was expecting nothing but to fall an eternal sacrifice unto Divine justice, the eternal Son of God, in His infinite love and pity to perishing sinners steps in as a Mediator and Surety; offering not only to take our nature but to take our law-place, to stand in our room and stead whereby the whole obligation of the law, both penal and preceptive, did fall upon Him; that is, He becomes liable and obliged both to fulfil the command, and to endure the curse of the covenant of works, which we had violate. And here, by the way, it is fit to advertise you, that it was an act of amazing grace in the Lord Jehovah, to admit a surety in our room; for, had He stood to the rigour and severity of the law, He would have demanded a personal satisfaction, without admitting of the satisfaction of a surety; in which case Adam, and all his posterity, had fallen under the stroke of avenging justice through eternity. But glory to God in the highest, who not only admitted of a Surety, but provided One, and laid help upon One that is mighty.

4. Christ, the eternal Son of God, being, in the fulness of time, made of a woman, and made under the law, as our Surety, He actually, in our room and stead, fulfilled the whole terms of the covenant of works; that is, in a word, He obeyed all the commands of the law, and endured the curse of it, and thereby brings in a complete law-righteousness, whereby guilty sinners are justified before God. And this is the righteousness by which we are exalted. By His active and passive obedience, He magnifies the law, and makes it honourable, and the Lord declares Himself to be well pleased for His righteousness sake.

5. Although Christ obeyed the law, and satisfies justice, and thereby brought in an everlasting law-righteousness, for a whole elect world; yet the elect of God are never exalted by virtue of this righteousness, till, in a day of power, they be brought to receive it by faith, and submit to it for justification before God. We disclaim that Antinomian error of an actual justification from eternity, or yet of a formal justification, bearing date from the death of Christ. We own indeed, with all Protestant sound divines, that it was the purpose of God to justify His elect from eternity, and that all the elect were represented by Christ in His obedience unto the death: but that they are actually justified before conversion, or before their application by faith unto the blood of Jesus, is impossible; because the sentence of the broken law stands always in force against them till they actually believe in the Son of God; for he that believeth not, is condemned already. And how can they be both justified and condemned at the same time? Till then, they are children of wrath, even as others.*

* Readers should note that this is an instructive paragraph regarding pre-conversion state of the elect. — Editor.

1. This righteousness of the Surety is conveyed unto us by imputation; as is abundantly plain from many places of Scripture, particularly Rom. 4, 6, 11, 12, 23, 24. God reckons what the Surety did in our room unto us: so that His righteousness becomes as much ours for justification before God, as though we had obeyed the law, and satisfied justice in God, as though we had obeyed the law, and satisfied justice in our own person. Now, this imputation of the Surety’s righteousness runs principally upon these two or three things. (1) Upon the eternal transaction between the Father and the Son, wherein the Son of God was chosen and sustained as the Surety of an elect world. Then it was that He gave bond to the Father, to pay their debt in the red gold of His blood, saying, Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire:— Lo, I come:— I delight to do Thy Will. (2) It is grounded upon the actual imputation of our sins unto Him: The Lord laid on Him the iniquity of us all. There is a blessed exchange of places between Christ and His people: He takes on our sin and unrighteousness, that we may be clothed with the white robe of His righteousness (2 Cor, v. 21). He was made sin for us, who knew no sin: that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. (3) This imputation goes upon the ground of the mystical union between Christ and the believer. When the poor soul is determined in a day of power to embrace the Lord Jesus in the arms of faith, Christ and he do that very moment coalesce into one body. He becomes a branch of the noble vine: a member of that body whereof Christ is the glorious Head of eminence, influence, and government. And being thus united to Christ, the long and white robe of the Mediator’s righteousness is spread over him, whereby he is not only freed from condemnation, but for ever sustained as righteous in the sight of God (1 Cor. i. 30). But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.

II. The second general head was, to offer a few properties of this righteousness in which believers are exalted, from whence its excellency will appear.

1. Then, it is an every way perfect and spotless righteousness: and how can it be otherwise, seeing it is the righteousness of God? So perfect is it, that the holy law is not only fulfilled, but magnified and made honourable thereby (Isa. 42:21). So perfect is this righteousness, that the piercing eye of infinite justice cannot find the least flaw in it: yea, justice is so fully satisfied therewith, that God speaks of the soul who is clothed therewith, as though it were in a state of innocence, and perfectly freed from sin. Thou art all fair, My love, there is no spot in thee. He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither has He seen perverseness in Israel. Indeed He beholds many spots on the believers considered in himself, but not a spot is in him, considered as under the covert of this spotless righteousness.

2. It is a meritorious righteousness. The redemption of the soul is so precious, that it would have ceased for ever, unless it had been redeemed by this righteousness; for silver and gold, and such corruptible things, could never do it. Lay Heaven and all the glories thereof, in the balance with this righteousness they would be all light as a feather, compared with it. Heaven is called a purchased inheritance, and this righteousness is the price that bought it. There is such merit in it, that it expiates sins of the blackest hue, and redeems a whole elect world from wrath and ruin. Yea, such is the intrinsic value of it, that, had it been so designed, it was sufficient to have redeemed the whole posterity of Adam, yea, ten thousand worlds of angels and men, upon a supposition of their existence and fall. O with what confidence then may a poor soul venture its eternal salvation upon this bottom.

3. It is an incomparable righteousness. There is no righteousness among the creatures that can be compared with it. Compare it with our own righteousness by the law, and the Apostle Paul will tell us, that he reckoned his Pharisaical righteousness before conversion, yea, his own obedience after conversion but as dung when laid in the balance with it (Phil.3). Compare it with Adam’s righteousness in a state of innocence, or yet with the righteousness of the spotless angels, they are but like glow-worms when compared with this sun: the one is but the righteousness of a creature but here is the righteousness of God.

4. It is a soul-beautifying and adorning righteousness (Isa. 61: 10). I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God, for He hath clothed me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels. The poor soul, that was black by lying among the pots, when clothed with this robe, shines as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold.

5. It is an everlasting righteousness, as the prophet Daniel calls it (chap. 9: 24). Indeed this righteousness had no being, save in the purpose and promise of God, till Christ actually appeared in our nature, and satisfied the commands of the law, and demands of justice: however, upon that very being that it had in the purpose and promise of God, it became effectual for the justification of all the Old Testament saints. This righteousness then, I say, is an everlasting righteousness, both as to the contrivance and duration of it. The contrivance of it bears date from the council of peace in the ancient years of eternity; for the Surety was set up from everlasting. And as it is everlasting in its root, so also in its fruit; for upon this righteousness the saints will stand and be acquitted at the day of Judgment; and upon this bottom they will have their standing in Heaven through eternity. The song of the redeemed for ever will be, He loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood.

6. It is a soul dignifying and exalting righteousness. Solomon (Prov. xiv. 34) speaking of equity in the administration of justice, says that even that kind of righteousness exalteth a nation. I am sure this holds true of the imputed righteousness of the Lord Jesus, as you see in my text, In Thy righteousness shall they be exalted. But this leads to

III. The third thing in the method, which was, to speak of the believer’s exaltation by virtue of this righteousness. And here I will very briefly shew, 1. What evils it exalts him above. 2. What happiness and dignity it exalts him to.

First, What evils it exalts him above.

1. It exalts him above the law as a covenant of works; yea, above both the commanding and condemning power of that covenant. Ye are not under the law, says the Apostle, but under grace (Rom. vi. 14). And if they be not under it, it follows that they are exalted above it. Indeed they are not, and cannot be above it as a rule of duty: no creature can be dispensed from the obligation of yielding obedience to the laws of the great Creator; and the believer, in a peculiar manner, is bound to obey the law of a Creator in the hand of a Mediator. But considering the law as a covenant of works, demanding the debt of obedience as a condition of life, or threatening eternal wrath in case of disobedience, the believer is indeed exalted above it by the righteousness of Christ. And if the law at any time attempt to bring the believer in bondage to it, he is to stand fast in the liberty where-with Christ hath made him free. The bond woman Hagar, with her offspring of legal fears and terrors, are cast out by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ (Gal. 4:30). If a believer in Christ shall hear the thunderings and curses of Mount Ebal, or Sinai, he has no reason to be affrighted; for Christ by His righteousness hath redeemed from the curse of the law. Thou art not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest:— but thou are come unto Mount Sion — and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel. The believer is dead to the law by the body of Christ, being married unto a better husband, even Him that is raised from the dead.

2. By this righteousness the believer is exalted above the world (Rev. 12:1). The women clothed with the sun, has the moon under her feet; which may not only point at the believer’s duty to soar heavenward in his affections, but also his privilege in Christ, to trample both upon the frowns and flatteries of this lower world; according to that of the Apostle, This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.

3. By this righteousness he is exalted above the power and malice of Satan. Indeed as long as the believer is on this side Jordan, the devil will be harassing him with his fiery darts, and do his utmost to make him go halting to Heaven; but by virtue of this righteousness, namely, the doing and dying of our ever-blessed Surety, the devil is both disarmed and destroyed. The head of the old serpent is bruised; for, through death He destroyed him that had the power of death, that is, the devil. And by faith in the blood and obedience of the Lord Jesus, the believer treads Satan under his feet; they overcome him by the blood of the Lamb.

4. By this righteousness the believer is exalted above death. Perhaps thou art in bondage through fear of death; thy heart is like to faint and fail thee, when thou lookest to the swellings of this Jordan. But take a view of this righteousness and thou shalt be exalted above the fears of it; for although thou be liable to the stroke of death, yet by this righteousness thou art freed from the sting of it. What is the sting of death? It is sin. Now, Christ has finished transgression, and made an end of sin by bringing in everlasting righteousness. And therefore thou mayst roll that word like a sweet morsel under thy tongue (Hos. 13, 14). I will ransom them from the power of the grave: I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plague; O grave, I will be thy destruction.

5. By this righteousness the believer is exalted above all accusations, from whatever quarter they may come (Rom. 8:33). There the Apostle gives a bold challenge, Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? The challenge is universal in respect of all accusers: as if he had said, Is there any in Heaven, earth, or hell, that can accuse them? It is universal in respect of all the accused; for the whole elect of God are comprehended, among whom there have been as great sinners as ever breathed on God’s earth. And it is universal in respect of all crimes: it is not said, Who shall lay this, or that, or the other crime to their charge? but, any thing? and what can be more comprehensive? Now, what is the ground of this bold challenge? It is grounded on the righteousness of Christ: for, says the Apostle, It is God that justifieth: who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, etc.

(to be continued)