The next thing to be considered, is the sense of those many scriptures, in which our Saviour is described as the Son of God, or the Son of the living God, or his only begotten Son, or his own or proper Son, as distinguished from all others, which, I humbly conceive, sets forth his glory, as Mediator, which we shall endeavour to prove. But, to prepare our way for the prosecution of this argument, as well as to prevent any misconstruction that might give prejudice thereunto, we shall take leave to premise,
1. That when we read of the Son of God, as dependent on the Father, inferior and obedient to him; and yet, as being equal with him, and having the same divine nature, we cannot conceive of any character which answers to all these ideas of sonship, unless that of a Mediator. If we consider the properties of sonship among men, every one who stands in this relation to a Father is dependent on him. In this respect, the father is the cause of his son, and it is not like other productions, for no effect can, properly speaking, be called a son, but that which hath the same kind of nature with his father; and the relation of sonship always connotes inferiority, and an obligation to yield obedience. I do not apply this, in every respect, to the Sonship of Christ, which no similitude, taken from mere creatures, can sufficiently illustrate; but his character, as Mediator, seems to answer to it, more than any thing else that can be said of him, since he has, as such, the same individual nature with the Father, and also is inferior to, and dependent on him. As a son, among men, is inferior to, and dependent on, his father, and, as the prophet speaks, Mal. i. 6. Honoureth his father; so whatever Christ is, as Mediator, he receives it from the Father, and, in all that he does, he honoureth his Father, as he says, John viii. 49. As the whole work of redemption is referred to the Father’s glory, and the commission, by which he acts as Mediator, is received from the Father, so, as a Son, he refers all the glory thereof to him.
2. This account of Christ’s Sonship does not take away any argument, by which we prove his Deity; for when we consider him as Mediator, we always suppose him to be both God and man, which is what we intend when we speak of the Person of Christ in this respect; so that, as God, he is equal with the Father, and has an equal right to divine adoration. This belongs to him as much, when considered as Mediator, as it can be supposed to do, if we consider his Sonship in any other respect.
3. It does not take away any argument to prove his distinct Personality from the Father and Holy Ghost, or, at least, if it sets aside that which is taken from the dependence of his Personality on the Father, as received from him by communication, it substitutes another in the room of it, inasmuch as to be a Mediator is, without doubt, a personal character; and because neither the Father, nor the Holy Ghost, can be said to be Mediators, it implies, that his Personality is distinct from theirs; likewise his acting as Mediator from the Father; and the Holy Spirit’s securing the glory which arises to him from hence, and applying the redemption purchased by him, is a farther proof of this distinction of the Persons in the Godhead.
4. Since we consider the Mediator as both God and man, in one Person, we do not suppose that this character respects either of his two natures, considered separately.
(1.) Not his divine nature. It is true, that his having the same nature with the Father might be reckoned, by some, a character of Sonship, as it contains one ingredient in the common idea that we have among men. They, as sons, are said to have the same kind of nature with their fathers; so our Saviour’s having the same individual nature with the Father might give occasion to some to denominate him, for that reason, his Son; but though this may be the foundation of his being called God’s proper Son, ιδιος υιος, yet this is not his distinguishing character as a Son: for it would follow from hence, that the Holy Ghost, who has the same nature with the Father, would, for that reason, be called his Son, which is contrary to the scripture-account given of him, as proceeding from the Father and the Son.
(2.) This character of Christ, as God-man, Mediator, does not respect his human nature, considered separately from his divine, nor any of those peculiar honours conferred upon it, beyond what any mere creatures are made partakers of.
This leads us to consider the difference between this notion of his Sonship, and that which was generally assigned, as the reason of his being so called, by the Socinians; these generally speak of Christ, as being denominated the Son of God, because of the extraordinary and miraculous conception, or formation, of his human nature in the womb of the Virgin; and for this they refer to that scripture in Luke i. 35.[[101]] The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the highest shall overshadow thee; therefore also that Holy Thing, which shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God. The sense, in which they understand this text, is, that Christ is called the Son of God, because of this extraordinary event: But we cannot think that a miraculous production is a sufficient foundation to support this character, and therefore must conclude, that the glory of Christ’s Sonship is infinitely greater than what arises from thence: therefore, I humbly conceive that this scripture is to be understood, with a small variation of the translation, in this sense, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, &c. because that Holy Thing, which shall be born of thee, shall be called, as he really is, the Son of God; that is, he is as Mediator, an extraordinary Person appointed to execute a glorious office, the Godhead and the manhood being to be united together, upon which account he is called the Son of God: and therefore it is expedient that the formation of his human nature should be in an extraordinary way, to wit, by the power of the Holy Ghost.
Again, there is a very wide difference between our account of Christ’s Sonship, as Mediator, and theirs, as taken from this scripture, in that they suppose that his being called the Son of God, refers only to some dignities conferred upon him, whom they suppose to be no more than a man. This is infinitely below the glory, which we ascribe to him, as Mediator, since their idea of him, as such, how extraordinary soever his conception was, argues him to be no more than a creature; but ours, as has been before observed, proves him a divine Person, since we never speak of him, as Mediator, without including both natures.
Having premised these things, to explain our sense of Christ’s being called the Son of God, as Mediator, we proceed to prove this from scripture. And here we are not under a necessity of straining the sense of a few scriptures, to make them speak agreeably to this notion of Christ’s Sonship; but, I think, we have the whole scripture, whenever it speaks of Christ, as the Son of God, as giving countenance to this plain sense thereof; so that I cannot find one place, in the whole New Testament, in which Christ is called the Son of God, but it is, with sufficient evidence, proved, from the context, that it is applied to him, as Mediator. Here we shall refer to several scriptures, in which he is so considered: thus that scripture before-mentioned, in Matth. xvi. 16. where Peter confesses, Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God; in which, speaking of him as Christ, or the Mediator, that is, the Person who was invested in the office, and came to perform the work of a Mediator, he is, in this respect, the Son of the living God; so when the high priest asked our Saviour, Matth. xxvi. 63. Art thou the Christ, the Son of God? that is, art thou the Messiah, as thou art supposed to be by thy followers? Our Saviour, in ver. 64. replied to him, Thou hast said, that is, it is as thou hast said; and then he describes himself in another character, by which he is often represented, as Mediator, and speaks of the highest degree of his Mediatorial glory to which he shall be advanced at his second coming, ver. 64. Nevertheless, I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven. And, doubtless, the centurion, and they who were with him, when they confessed that he was the Son of God, in Matth. xxvii. 54. understood by it, that he was the Messiah, or the Christ, which is a character by which he was most known, and which had been supported by so many miracles, and was now confirmed by this miracle of the earthquake, which gave him this conviction; also in Luke iv. 41. when the devils are represented as crying out, Thou art Christ, the Son of God, it follows, that they knew that he was Christ; so that the commonly received notion of our Saviour’s Sonship was, that he was the Christ. And in John xi. 3. when Jesus says concerning Lazarus, that his sickness was not unto death, that is, not such as that he should continue in the state of the dead, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby, the meaning is, that he might give a proof of his being the Christ, by raising him from the dead; therefore, when he speaks to Martha, with a design to try whether she believed he could raise her brother from the dead, and represents himself to her as the object of faith, she replies, ver. 27. I believe that thou art the Christ the Son of God, which should come into the world. Again, it is said, in Acts ix. 20. that Saul, when converted, preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God, that is, he proved him to be the Messiah; and accordingly, ver. 22. when he was establishing the same doctrine, it is said, that he proved that he was the very Christ.