Fifty Sermons, Sermons · Sermon 12
SERMON XII.
Preached at Lincolns Inne.
JOHN 5. 22.
The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgement to the Sonne.
When our Saviour forbids us to cast pearl before swine,Mat. 7. 6. we understand ordinarily in that place, that by pearl, are understood the Scriptures, and when we consider the naturall generation and production of Pearl, that they grow bigger and bigger, by a continuall succession, and devolution of dew, and other glutinous moysture that fals upon them, and there condenses and hardens, so that a pearl is but a body of many shels, many crusts, many films, many coats enwrapped upon one another. To this Scripture which we have in hand, doth that Metaphor of pearl very properly appertain, because our Saviour Christ in this Chapter undertaking to prove his own Divinity and God-head to the Jews, who acknowledged, and confessed the Father to be God, but denyed it of him, he folds and wraps up reason upon reason, argument upon argument, that all things are common between the Father and him, That whatsoever the Father does, he does, whatsoever the Father is, he is; for first, he says, he is a partner, a cooperator with the Father, in the present administration and government of the world,Verse 17. My Father worketh hitherto, and I work; well, if the Father do ease himself upon instruments now, yet was it so from the beginning? had he a part in the Creation? Yes; What things soever the Father doth, those also doth the Son likewise. But doe those extend to the work properly,Verse 19. and naturally belonging to God, to the remission, to the effusion of grace, to the spirituall resurrection of them that are dead in their iniquities? Yes, even to that too, For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickneth them,Verse 21. even to the Son quickneth whom he will. But hath not this power of his a determination, or expiration? shall it not end, at least when the world ends? no, not then, for God hath given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of man. Verse 27.Is there then no Supersedeas upon this commission? Is the Sonne equall with the Father in our eternall election, in our creation, in the meanes of our salvation, in the last judgement, in all? In all, Omne judicium, God hath committed all judgement to the Son; And here is a pearl made up, the dew of Gods grace sprinkled upon your souls, the beams of Gods Spirit shed upon your soules, that effectuall and working knowledge; That he who dyed for your salvation is perfect God, as well as perfect man, fit, as willing to accomplish that salvation.
In handling then this Iudgement, which is a word that embraces and comprehends all, All from our Election, where no merit or future actions of ours were considered by God to our fruition and possession of that election, where all our actions shall be considered and recompensed by him, we shall see first that Judgment belongs properly to God; And secondly, that God the Father whom we consider to be the root and foundation of the Deity, can no more devest his Judgment then he can his Godhead, and therefore in the third place we consider, what that committing of Judgment, which is mentioned here imports, and then to whom it is committed, To the Sonne: and lastly the largnesse of that which is committed, Omne, all Judgment, so that we cannot carry our thoughts so high, or so farre backwards, as to think of any Judgment given upon us in Gods purpose or decree without relation to Christ; Nor so far forward, as to think that there shall be a Judgment given upon us, according to our good, morall dispositions or actions, but according to our apprehension and imitation of Christ. Judgment is a proper and inseparable Character of God; that's first, the Father cannot devest himself of that; that's next. The third is that he hath committed it to another; And then the person that is his delegate, is his onelyonly Sonne, and lastly his power is everlasting; And that Judgment day that belongs to him, hath, and shall last from our first Election, through the participation of the meanes prepared by him in his Church, to our association and union with him in glory, and so the whole circle of time, and before time was, and when time shall be no more, makes up but one Judgment day to him, to whom the Father who judgeth no man hath committed all Judgment.
First then Judgment appertaines to God, It is his in Criminall causes,1. Part. … Vindicta mihi, Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord; It is so in civill things too; for God himself is proprietary of all, Domini est terra et plenitudo ejus,Iuticiū Dei… a Rom. 12. 19. The earth is the Lords, and all that is in, and on the earth; Your silver is mine, and your gold is mine, says the Prophet, and the beasts on a Thousand hills are mine, says David, you are usu…ructuaries of them, but I am proprietary; No attribute of God is so often iterated in the Scriptures, no state of God so often incultated, as this Judge, and Judgment: no word concerning God so often repeated, but it is brought to the height, where in that place of the Psalm, where we read, God judgeth among the Gods, the Latine Church ever read it,Psal. 82. 1. Deus dijudicat De…s, God judgeth the Gods themselves, for though God say of Judges and Magistrats, Ego dixi dii estis; I have said ye are Gods, (and if God say it, who shall gainsay it?) yet he says too, Moriemini, sicut homines, The greatest Gods upon earth shall die like men; And if that be not humiliation enough, there is more threatned in that which follows, yee shall fall like one of the Princes, for the fall of a Prince involves the ruine of many others too, and it fills the world with horror for the present, and ominous discourse for the future; but the farthest of all is Deus dijudicat Deos, even these Judges must come to Judgment, and therefore that Psalme which begins so, is concluded thus, Surge Domine, arise ô God, and judge the earth: If he have power to judge the earth, he is God, and even in God himselfe it is expressed as a kind of rising, as some exaltation of his power, that he is to Judge; And that place in the beginning of that Psalme many of the antients read in the future Dijudicabit, God, shall judge the Gods, because the frame of the Psalme seems to referre it to the last Judgment; Turtullian reads it Dijudicavit, as a thing past, God hath judged in all times; and the letter of the text requires it to be in the present, Dijudicat. Collect all, and Judgment is so essentiall to God, as that it is coeternall with him, he hath, he doth, and he will judge the world, and the Judges of the world, other Judges die likemen, weakely, and they fall, that's worse ignominiously, and they fall like Princes, that's worst, fearfully, and yet scornfully, and when they are dead and faln, they rise no more to execute Judgment, but have Judgment executed upon them the Lord dyes not, nor he falls not, and if he seem to slumber, the Martyrs under the Altar awake him with their Vsque quo Domine, how long O Lord before thou execute Iudgment? And he will arise and Judge the world, for Judgment is his; God putteth downe one, and setteth up another, says David; Psal 75. 7.where hath he that power? Why, God is the Judge, not a Judge, but the Judge, and in that right he putteth downe one, and setteth up another.
Now for this Judgment, which we place in God,Iudicinm detestationis. we must consider in God three notions, three apprehensions, three kinds of Judgment. First, God hath Iudicium detestationis, God doth naturally know, and therefore naturally detest evill; for no man in the extreamest corruption of nature is yet fallen so far, as to love or approve evill at the same time that he knows, and acknowledges it to be evill. But we are so blind in the knowledge of evill, that we needed that great supplement, and assistance of the law it self to make us know what was evill; Moses magnifies (and justly) the law, Non appropinqu…vit, says Moses, God came not so neare to any nation as to the Iews; Non taliter fecit, God dealt not so well with any nation, as with the Iews, and wherein? because he had given them a law, and yet we see the greatest dignity of this law, to be, That by the law is the knowledge of sinne; for though by the law of nature written in our hearts, there be some condemnation of some sinnes, yet to know that every sinne was Treason against God, to know that every sinne hath the reward of death, and eternall death annexed to it; this knowledge we have onelyonly by the law. Now if man will pretend to be a Judge, what an exact knowledge of the law is required at his hand? for some things are sinne to one nation, which are not to another, as where the just authority of the lawfull Magistrate, changes the nature of the thing, and makes a thing naturally indifferent, necessary to them, who are under his obedience; some things are sinnes at one time, which are not at another, as all the ceremoniall law, created new sinnes which were not sinnes before the law was given, nor since it expir'd; some things are sinnes in a man now, which will not be sinnes in the same man to morrow, as when a man hath contracted a just scruple, against any particular action, it is a sinne to doe it during the scruple, and it may be sinne in him to omit it, when he hath devested the scruple; onelyonly God hath Iudicium detestationis, he knows, and therefore detests evill, and therefore flatter not thy self with a Tush, God sees it not, or, Tush, God cares not, Doth it disquiet him or trouble his rest in heaven that I breake his Sabbath here? Doth it wound his body, or draw his bloud there, that I swear by his body and bloud here? Doth it corrupt any of his virgins there, that I sollicit the chastity of a woman here? Are his Martyrs withdrawn from their Allegeance, or retarded in their service to him there, because I dare not defend his cause, nor speake for him, nor fight for him here? Beloved, it is a degree of superstition, and an effect of an undiscreet zeale, perchance, to be too forward in making indifferent things necessary, and so to imprint the nature, and sting of sin where naturally it is not so: certainly it a more slippery and irreligious thing to be too apt to call things meerely indifferent, and to forget that even in eating and drinking, waking and sleeping, the glory of God is intermingled, as if we knew exactly the prescience and foreknowledge of God, there could be nothing contingent or casuall, (for though there be a contingency in the nature of the thing, yet it is certain to God) so if we considered duly, wherein the glory of God might be promov'd in every action of ours, there could scarce by any action so indifferent, but that the glory of God would turne the scale and make it necessary to me, at that time; but then private interests, and private respects create a new indifferency to my apprehension, and calls me to consider that thing as it is in nature, and not as it is considered with that circumstance of the glory of God, and so I lose that Iudicium detestationis, which onelyonly God hath absolutely and perfectly to know, and therefore to detest evill, and so he is a Judge.
And as he is a Judge, so Iudicat rem, he judges the nature of the thing, he is so too, as he hath Iudicium discretionis, and so Iudicat personam, he knows what is evill,Iudicium discretionis. and he discernes when thou committest that evill. Here you are fain to supply defects of laws, that things done in one County may be tryed in another; And that in offences of high nature, transmarine offences may be inquir'd and tryed here; But as the Prophet says;Esay 40. 12. Who measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, or meted … the heavens with a span, who comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, or weighed the mountains in a scale? So I say, who hath divided heaven into shires or parishes, or limited the territories and Jurisdictions there, that God should not have Iudicium discretionis, the power of discerning all actions, in all places? When there was no more to be seen, or considered upon the whole earth but the garden of Paradise, for from the beginning Deliciae ejus esse cum filiis hominum, Gods delight was to be with the sons of men, and man was only there, shal we not deminish God nor speak too vulgarly of him to say, that he hovered like a Falcon over Paradise, and that from that height of heaven, the piercing eye of God, saw so little a thing, as the forbidden fruit, and what became of that, and the reaching …are of God heard the hissing of the Serpent, and the whispering of the woman, and what was concluded upon that? Shall we think it little to have seen to have things done in Paradise when there was nothing else to divert his eye, nothing else to distract his counsels, nothing else done upon the face of the earth? Take the earth now as it is replenished, and take it either as it is torn and crumbled into raggs, and shivers, not a kingdome, not a family, not a man agreeing with himselfe; Or take it in that concord which is in it, as All the Kings of the earth set themselves,Psalm 2. 2. and all the Rulers of the earth take counsell together against the Lord; take it in this union, or this division, in this concord, or this discord, still the Lord that sitteth in the heavens discernes all, looks at all, laughs at all, and hath them all in derision. Earthly Judges have their distinctions, and so their restrictions, some things they cannot know, what mortall man can know all? Some things they cannot take knowledge of, for they are bound to evidence: But God hath Iudicium discretionis, no mist, no cloud, no darknesse, no disguise keeps him from discerning, and judging all our actions, and so he is a Judge too.
And he is so lastly, as he hath Iudicium retributionis, God knows what is evill, he knows when that evill is done, and he knows, how to punish and recompense that evill: for the office of a Judge who judges according to a law, being not to contract, or extend that law, but to declare what was the true meaning of that Law-maker when hee made that law, God hath this judgement in perfection, because hee himself made that law by which he judges, and therefore when he hath said, Morte morieris; If thou do this, thou shalt die a double death, where he hath said, Stipendium peccati mors est, every sin shall be rewarded with death; If I sinne against the Lord, who shall entreat for me? Who shall give any other interpretation,1 Sam. 2. 15. any modification, any Non obstante upon his law in my behalf, when he comes to judge me according to that law which himself hath made? Who shall think to delude the Judge, and say, Surely this was not the meaning of the Law-giver, when he who is the Judge was the Law-maker too?
And then as God is Judge in all these respects,Sine Appellatione. so is he a Judge in them all, Sine Appellatione, and Sine judiciis, man cannot appeal from God, God needs no evidence from man; for, for the Appeal first, to whom should we appeal from the Soveraign … Wrangle as long as ye will who is Chief Justice, and which Court hath Juris… over another; I know the Chief Justice, and I know the Soveraign … the King of heaven and earth shall send his ministring Spirits, his Angels to the …, and bowels of the Earth, and to the bosome, and bottome of the Sea, and Earth must deliver, Corpus cum causâ, all the bodies of the dead, and all their actions, to receive a judgement in this Court: when it will be but an erroneous, and frivolous Appeal, to call to the Hils to fall down upon us, and the Mountains to cover, and hide us from the wrathfull judgment of God. He is a Judge then Sine appellatione, without any Appeal, from him, he is so too Sine judiciis, without needing any evidence from us. Now if I be wary in my actions here, incarnate Devils, detractors, and informers cannot accuse me; If my sinne come not to action, but lye onelyonly in my heart, the Devill himself who is the accuser of the brethren, hath no evidence against me, but God knows my heart; doth not he that pondereth the heart, understand it? Prov. 24. 12.where it is not in that faint word, which the vulgar Edition hath expressed it in, inspector cordium, That God sees the heart; but the word is Tochen, which signifies every where to weigh, to number, to search, to examine, as the word is used by Salomon again, The Lord weigheth the spirits, and it must be a ready hand,Prov. 16. 2. and exact scales that shall weigh spirits. So that though neither man, nor Devill, nay nor my self give evidence against me, yea, though I know nothing by my selfe, I am not thereby justified, why? where is the farther danger?1 Cor. 4. 4. In this which follows there in Saint Paul, He that judges me is the Lord, and the Lord hath meanes to know my heart better then my self: And therefore, as Saint Augustine makes use of those words, Abyssus Abyssum invocat, one depth cals upon another, The infinite depth of my sins must call upon the more infinite depth of Gods mercy, for if God, who is Judge in all these respects, judicio detestationis, he knows, and abhors evill, and judicio discretionis, he discerns every evill person, and every evill action, judicio retributionis, he can, and will recompense evill with evill; And all these Sine Appellatione, we cannot appeal from him, & Sine judiciis, he needs no evidence from us; If this judgement enter into judgement with me, not onelyonly not I, but not the most righteous man, no, nor the Church whom he hath washed in his blood, that she might be without spot or wrinckle, shall appear righteous in his sight.
This being then thus, that Iudgement is an unseparable character of God the Father, 2. Part.being Fons Deitatis, the root and spring of the whole Deity, how is it said, that the Father judgeth no man? Not that we should conceive a wearinesse, or retiring in the Father, or a discharging of himself upon the shoulders, and labours of another, in the administration, and judging of this world; for as it is truly said, that God rested the seventh day, that is, he rested from working in that kind, from creating, so it is true that Christ says here; My Father worketh yet, and I work, and so as it is truly said here, The Father judgeth no man, it is truly sayd by Christ too, of the Father, I seek not mine own glory, there is one that seeketh, and judgeth; still it is true, that God hath Iudicium detestationis, Thy eyes are pure eyes O Lord, and cannot behold iniquity, says the Prophet, still it is true, that hee hath Iudicium discretionis (because they committed villany in Israel, and I know it, Ier. 29. 23.saith the Lord;) still it is true, that he hath Iudicium retributionis, The Lord killeth and maketh alive,1 Sam. 2. 6. he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up; still it is true, that he hath all these sine appellatione; for go to the Sea, or Earth, or Hell, as David makes the distribution, and God is there; and he hath them sine judiciis, for our witnesse is in heaven, and our record is on high: Iob 16. 19.All this is undeniably true, and besides this, that great name of God, by which he is first called in the Scriptures Elohim, is not inconveniently deriv'd from Elah, which is Iurare to swear, God is able as a Judge to minister an oath unto us, and to draw evidence from our own consciences against our selves, so that then, the Father he judges still, but he judges as God, and not as the Father. In the three great judgements of God, the whole Trinity judges, In the first judgement, before all times, which was Gods Judiciary separating of vessels of honour, from vessels of dishonour, in our Election, and Reprobation; In his second judgement, which is in execution now, which is Gods judiciary separating of servants from enemies, in the seales, and in the administration of the Christian Church; and in the last judgement, which shall be Gods Judiciary separating of sheep from goats, to everlasting glory, or condemnation; in all these three judgements, all the three Persons of the Trinity are Judges. Consider God altogether, and so in all outward works, all the Trinity concurres, because all are but one God; but consider God in relation, in distinct Persons, and so the severall Persons do something in which the other Persons are not interessed; The Sonne hath not a generation from himself, so, as he had from the Father, and from the holy Ghost, as a distinct person, he had none at all; the holy Ghost had a proceeding from the Father and Son, but from the Sonne as a person, who had his generation from another, but not so from the Father. Not to stray into clouds, or perplexities in this contemplation, God, that is, the whole Trinity, judges still, but so as the Sonne judgeth, the Father judgeth not, for that Judgment he hath committed.
That we may husband our hour well,Commisit. and reserve as much as we can for our two last considerations, the Cui, & Quid, to whom, and that's to the Sonne, and what he hath committed, and that's all Iudgement, we will not stand much upon this, more needs not then this; That God in his wisdome foreseeing, that man for his weaknesse would not be able to settle himself upon God and his judgments, as they are meerly heavenly, and spirituall, out of his abundant goodnesse hath established a judgement, and ordained a Judge upon earth like himself, and like our selves too, That as no man hath seen God, so no man should goe about to see his unsearchable decrees, and judgements, but rest in those sensible, and visible meanes which he hath afforded, that is, Christ Jesus speaking in his Church, and applying his blood unto us in the Sacraments to the worlds end: God might have suffered Abraham to rest in the first generall promise, Semen mulieris, the Seed of the woman shall bruise the Serpents head, but he would bring it neerer to a visible, to a personall Covenant, In semine tuo, In thy Seed shall all nations be blessed; he might well have let him rest in that appropriation of the promise to his race, but he would proceed farther, and seal it with a sensible seal in his flesh with Circumcision; he might have let him rest in that ratification, that a Messias should come by that way, but he would continue it by a continuall succession of Prophets, till that Messias should come; and now that he is come and gone, still God pursues the same way; How should they believe, except they hear? and therefore God evermore supplies his Church with visible and sensible meanes, and knowing the naturall inclination of man, when he cannot have, or cannot comprehend the originall, and prototype, to satisfie, and refresh himself with a picture, or representation; So, though God hath forbidden us that slippery, and frivolous, and dangerous use of graven Images, yet hee hath afforded us his Sonne, who is the image of the invisible God, and so more proportionall unto us, more apprehensible by us;Col. 1. 15. And so this committing is no more but that God in another form, then that of God, hath manifested his power of judging, and this committing, this manifestation is in Filio, in his Son.
But in the entrance into the handling of this,Filio. we aske onelyonly this question, Cui filio, to which Sonne of God is this commission given? Not that God hath more Sons then one; but because that Sonne is his Sonne by a two-fold filiation; by an eternall, and inexpressible generation, and by a temporary, but miraculous incarnation, in which of these rights is this commission derived upon him? doth he judge as he is the Son of God? or as he is the Son of man? I am not ordinarily bold in determining points (especially if they were fundamentall) wherein I find the Fathers among themselves, and the School in it selfe, and the reverend Divines of the Reformation amongst themselves to differ; But yet neither am I willing to raise doubts, and leave the auditory unsatisfyed, and unsetled; we are not upon a Lecture, but upon a Sermon, and therefore we will not multiply variety of opinions; summe up the Fathers upon one side in Saint Ambrose mouth, and they will say with him, Huic dedit ubique generundo, non largiendo, God gave his Sonne this commission then (and when was that then?) then when he begot him, and then he must have it by his eternall generation, as the Son of God: sum up the Fathers on the other side, in Saint Augustines mouth, and there they will say with him, that it is so clear, and so certain, that whatsoever is said in the Scripture to be committed, and given to Christ, belongs to Christ as the Son of man, and not as the Son of God, as that th'other opinion cannot be maintained; and at this distance we shall never bring them to meet, but take in this rule, Iudicium convenit ei ut homo, causa ut Deus, God hath given Christ this commission as man, but Christ had not been capable of this commission if he had not been God too, and so it is easily reconcil'd: If we shall hold simply to the letter of the text, Pater dedit, then it will seem to have been committed to him in his eternall generation, because that was a work of the Fathers onelyonly, and in that generation the holy Ghost had no part; But since in this judgement, which is now committed to him, the holy Ghost hath a part, (for as we said before, the Judgement is an act of the whole Trinity) we must look for a commission from the whole Trinity, and that is as he is man, for, tota Trinitas univit humanitatem, August,The hypostaticall union of God and man in the person of Christ, was a work of the whole Trinity.
Taking it then so setled, that the capacity of this Judgment, and (if we may say so) the future title to it, was given to him, as God by his essence, in his eternall generation, by which non vitae particeps, sed vitae naturaliter est, we cannot say that Christ hath life,Cy…ill. but that he is life, for whatsoever the Father is, he is, excepting onelyonly the name and relation of Father, the capacity, the ability is in him, eternally before any imaginable, any possible consideration of time; But the power of the actuall execution of this Judgement, which is given, and is committed, is in him as man: because as the same Father says, Ad heminem dicitur, Quid habes quod non accepisti? When Saint Past says, What hast thou that thou hast not received? he asks that question of a man, that which is received, is received as man, For as Bellarmine in a place where he disposes himself to quarrell,De Christo. l. 2. c. 19. at some few words of Calvins, though he confesse the matter to be true, and (as he cals it there) Catholique, says, Essentiam genitam negamus, we confesse that Christ hath not his essence from his Father by generation, the relation, the filiation, he hath from his Father, he hath the name of Son, but he hath not this execution of this judgement by that relation, by that filiation, still as the Son of God, he hath the capacity, as the Sonne of man, he hath the execution; And therefore Prosper that follows S. Augustine limits perchance too narrowly to the very flesh, to the humanity, Ipsa (not Ipsae) …rit Iudex, quae sub Iudice stetit, and ipsa judicabit, quae judicatae est, where he places not this Judgement upon the mixt person (which is the safest way) of God and man, but upon man alone, God hath appointed a day, in which duplicate page duplicate page he will judge the world in righteousnesse; But by whom? By that man whom he hath ordained God will judge still; but still in Christ; and therefore says S. Augustine upon those words: Arise O Lord, and judge the earth, Cui Deo dicitur surge, nisi ei qui dormivit? What God doth David call upon to arise, but that God who lay down to sleep in the grave? as though he should say (says August.) Dormivisti judicatus à terra, surge & jud…ca terram. So that to collect all, though judgement be such a character of God as he cannot devest, yet the Father hath committed such a Judgement to the Sonne, as none but he can execute.
And what is that? Omne judicium, all judgement, that is, omne imperium,Omne judicium. omnem potestatem; It is presented in the name of Judgement, but it involves all, It is literally, and particularly Judgement in S. Iohn,5. 27. The Father hath given him authority to execute judgement, It is extended unto power in Saint Matthew,28. 18. All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth; And it is enlarg'd as far farther, as can be expressed or conceived in another place of Saint Matthew, All things are deliver'd to me of my Father. 11. 27.Now all things our Saviour Christ Jesus exercises, either per carnem, or at least in carne, whatsoever the Father does, the Sonne does too, In carne, because now there is an unseparable union betwixt God and the humane nature: The Father creates new souls every day in the inanimation of Children, and the Sonne creates them with him; The Father concurs with all second causes as the first moving cause of all naturall things, and all this the Sonne does too; but all this in carne; Though he be in our humane flesh, he is not the lesse able to doe the acts belonging to the Godhead, but per carnem, by the flesh instrumentally, visibly, he executes judgement, because he is the Son of man, God hath been so indulgent to man, as that there should be no judgement given upon man, but man should give it; Christ then having all Judgment, we refresh to your memory those three Judgements which we toucht upon before; first, the Judgement of our Election, severing of vessels of honour and dishonor; next, the Judgement of our Justification here severing of friends from enemies; and then the Judgment of our Glorification, severing sheep from goats;Iudicium Electionis. and for the first, of our Election, As if I were under the condemnation of the Law, for some capitall offence, and going to execution, and the Kings mercy expressed in a sealed pardon were presented me, I should not stand to enquire what mov'd the King to doe it, what hee said to any body else, what any body else said to him, what hee saw in mee, or what hee look't for at my hands, but embrace that mercy cheerfully, and thankfully, and attribute it onelyonly to his abundant goodnesse: So, when I consider my selfe to have been let fall into this world, in massa Damnata, under the generall condemnation of mankind, and yet by the working of Gods Spirit, I find at first a desire, and after a modest assurance, that I am delivered from that condemnation, I enquire not what God did in his bed-chamber, in his cabinet counsell, in his eternall decree, I know that hee hath made Iudicium electionis in Christ Jesus: And therefore that I may know, whether I doe not deceive my selfe, in presuming my self to be of that number, I come down, and examine my selfe whether I can truly tell my conscience, that Christ Jesus dyed for mee, which I cannot doe, if I have not a desire and an endevour to conform my self to him; And if I do that, there I finde my Predestination, I am a Christian, and I will not offer to goe before my Master Christ Jesus, I cannot be sav'd before there was a Saviour, In Christ Jesus is Omne judicium, all judgement, and therefore the judgment of Election, the first separation of vessels of honour and dishonour in Election and Reprobation was in Christ Jesus.
Much more evidently is the second judgement of our Justification by means ordain'd in the Christian Church, the Judgement of Christ, it is the Gospel of Christ which is preacht to you there, There is no name given under heaven whereby you should be saved, there are no other means wherby salvation should be applyed in his name given, but those which he hath instituted in his Church; So that when I come to the second …udgement, to try whether I stand justifyed in the sight of Christ, or no, I come for that Judgement to Christ in his Church; Doe I remember what I contracted with Christ Jesus, when I took the name of a Christian at my entrance into his Church by Baptism? Doe I find I have endevoured to perform those Conditions? Doe I find a remorse when I have not performed them? Doe I feele the remission of those sinnes applyed to me when I hear the gracious promises of the Gospel shed upon repentant sinners by the mouth of his Minister? Have I a true and solid consolation, (without shift, or disguise, or flattering of my conscience) when I receive the seal of his pardon in the Sacrament? Beloved, not in any morall integrity, not in keeping the conscience of an honest man, in generall, but in using well the meanes ordain'd by Christ in the Christian Church, am I justified. And therefore this Judgement of Justification is his too. And then the third and last judgement, which is the judgment of Glorification,Iudiciū Glorificationis. Apot. 1. 7. that's easily agreed by all to appertain unto Christ, Idem Iesus, The same Iesus that ascended, shall come to judgement, Videbunt quem pupugerant, Apoc. 1. 7.Every eye shall see him, and they also which pierc't him; Then the Son of man shall come in glory, and he, as man, shall give the judgement, for things done, or omitted towards him as man, for not feeding, for not clothing, for not harbouring, for not visiting. The sum of all is, that this is the overflowing goodnesse of God, that he deales with man by the sonne of man; and that hee hath so given all judgement to the Sonne, as that if you would be tryed by the first judgement; are you elected or no? The issue is, doe you believe in Christ Jesus, or no? If you would be tryed by the second judgement, are you justified or no? The issue is, doe you find comfort in the application of the Word, and Sacraments of Christ Jesus, or no? If you would be tryed by the third Judgement, do you expect a Glorification, or no? The issue is, Are you so reconcil'd to Christ Jesus now, by hearty repentance for sinnes past, and by detestation of occasion of future sin, that you durst welcome that Angel which should come at this time, and sweare that time should be no more, that your transmigration out of this world should be this minute, and that this minute you might say unfeignedly and effectually, Veni Domine Iesu; come quickly, come now; if this be your state, then are you partakers of all that blessednesse, which the Father intended to you, when for your sake, he committed all Judgment to the Son.