THERE is an infinite fulness in Jesus Christ. “It pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell,” Col. i., 19. The covenant of grace is suited to all the exigences and indigences of a poor, undone, convinced sinner; it is “ordered in all things,” II. Sam. xxiii., 5. In opposition to the power of corruption in the heart, “I will put,” saith God, “my law in their inward parts,” Jer. xxxi., 33, 34. In opposition to error and ignorance in the understanding, “They shall all know me.” In opposition to guilt, “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember
their sin no more.” And the offices of Jesus Christ are suited to all the branches of the covenant. In order to the first branch, “I will write my law in their hearts.” Behold Jesus Christ is a King. In order to the second, “They shall all know me,” behold Jesus Christ is a Prophet. And in order to the third, “I will forgive their iniquities,” behold Jesus Christ is a Priest. The offices of Christ fill and execute the covenant of grace; and the fulness of God fills and acts the offices of Jesus Christ; the power of God, and the fulness of power, His kingly office. The wisdom of God, and the fulness of wisdom, His prophetical office. The righteousness of God, and the fulness of righteousness, His priestly office. This is that which the Psalmist celebrateth in that song of loves, “God hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows,” Psalm xlv., 7. Never king was anointed with such power, never prophet with such wisdom, never priest with such grace and righteousness: they had their stunted proportions; but “God gave not the Spirit by measure unto Him,” John iii., 34. “In Him dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily,” Col. ii., 9. It is not less than an infinite fulness which fills Jesus Christ as Mediator, that we of His fulness might receive grace for grace. But we are not always in a capacity either to receive or to see that fulness. And the reason is, because in our prosperity we fill ourselves so with the world, with the pleasures and profits of the world, that it fares with Christ now as it did when He was born, there is no room for Him in the inn. While the world glitters in our eyes with her painted gaudery, “He hath no form nor comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him,” Isa. liii., 2. We are very prone to love the world for the world, terminate our affections in the creature, and do not use earthly comforts in that way, and to that end, that we might thereby be the more fitted to walk with God; and when our desires are such, the more they are, the less are our delights in Jesus Christ. This is our sin and folly, that we do not fear the unlawful use of lawful things; nor see where the snare lieth to inveigle those affections to the creature which are only due to God Himself; and a great reproach it is to Jesus Christ. But now when God spreads sackcloth upon all the beauty and bravery of the creature, and so hideth pride from man, when God by some flashes of lightning strikes us blind to the world, then we can discover beauty and excellency in Christ, infinitely transcending all the beauty and excellency in the world; “Thou are fairer than the children of men, grace is poured into thy lips,” Psalm xlv., 2, when under the stairs and in the clefts of the rocks, then the soul can sing, “My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand,” Song v., 10. When the God of heaven hath famished all our gods on earth, when He hath hunger-starved us, as to creature-comforts, in any way whatsoever, then we can hunger after and taste the sweetness, the fulness, which is in Jesus Christ; Oh! then, Christ, a King to govern, a Prophet to teach, a Priest to save, how precious; then none but Christ, none but Christ; give me Christ or else I die. In a word, my beloved, when once it is come, by what exigences and surprises soever, to an, oh wretch that I am, who shall deliver me? then, “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord,” Rom. vii., 24, 25. Truly God sees it absolutely necessary to exercise us with a severe discipline, that He may endear Jesus Christ to our hearts; and seclude us from the world, that we may study and improve His
fulness. As the law is our schoolmaster, so affliction is an usher to the law; affliction brings us to the law, and the law brings us to Christ, Gal. iii., 24.—Case’s Correction, Instruction: The Rod and the Word.