The Saints’ Knowledge of Christ’s Love

That ye … may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge (Eph 3:18-19).

In the first chapter the apostle dealt with the doctrine of election, and in the second with the reconciling of the Gentiles with the Jews to the Father, by his Son, through the preaching of the gospel. Now in the third chapter he comes to show that this too was determined before the world began, just as election was. The afflictions that come with the gospel were raging among these Ephesians, and so that they would not darken the glory of these things for them, he gives them here a brief repetition and explanation. He does this so that they might be held up and enabled to live above those afflictions. He also joins to it a fervent prayer for them: that God would let them see, in the spirit and by faith, how they are secured by God and by Christ from the harm of the worst that might come upon them. “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named; that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge …” (Eph 3:14-19). He prayed this knowing that if they had a deep understanding of the good these things held in store for them, they would never be discouraged, whatever troubles might come with their profession of faith.

Breadth, and length, and depth, and height are words that, taken by themselves, are both ambiguous and full of wonder. They are ambiguous because they are left unexplained. They are full of wonder because they carry in them something that cannot be expressed, and that something far outgoes everything that can be found in this world. The apostle was taken by a spiritual surprise here. While he was meditating and writing, he was caught up: the strength and glory of the truths he was trying to fasten upon the people he wrote to carried him away into their glory, beyond what could be fully uttered.

Besides, things are often expressed this way on purpose, to command our attention and make the mind stop and pause over them, and by their greatness to turn the heart away from the world, toward which our hearts are naturally so inclined. Truths are also often delivered to us like wheat still in the full ear, so that we have to rub them out before we eat them, and take pains over them before we have the comfort of them.

Breadth, length, depth, and height. In trying to open these words, I will first give you some others of the same kind. Then I will show you, first, the reason for them, and second, something of their fullness.

Words of the same kind are sometimes used to show us the power, force, and cunning of the enemies of God’s church (Dan 4:11; Rom 8:38-39). But most properly they are used to show us the infinite and unsearchable greatness of God (Job 11:7-9; Rom 11:33).

Here they are to be taken in this second sense, that is, to suggest to us the unsearchable and infinite greatness of God. He is a breadth beyond all breadths, a length beyond all lengths, a depth beyond all depths, and a height beyond all heights, and that in all his attributes. He is an eternal being, an everlasting being, and in that respect he is beyond all measures, whether of breadth, or length, or depth, or height. In all his attributes he is beyond all measure, whether you measure by words, by thoughts, or by the widest and most exquisite understanding. His greatness is unsearchable; his judgments are unsearchable (Job 5:9). He is infinite in wisdom: “O! the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” (Rom 11:33). “If I speak of strength, lo, he is strong” (Job 9:19); yes, “the thunder of his power who can understand?” (Job 26:14). “There is none holy as the Lord” (1 Sam 2:2), “and his mercy is from everlasting to everlasting, upon them that fear him” (Ps 103:17).

The greatness of God, of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, is the thing that, if it is rightly considered, will hold up the spirits of those among his people who are frightened by the greatness of their enemies. For here is a greatness set against a greatness. Pharaoh was great, but God was greater: greater in power, greater in wisdom, greater in every way for the help of his people. In the very thing in which they dealt proudly, he was above them. So these words take in, for this people, the great God, who in his immensity and infinite greatness is beyond all beings. But to come now:

First, to the reason for the words. They are used to show the Ephesians that God, with all that he is in himself and all that he has in his power, is wholly for the use and profit of believers. Otherwise these words would hold out nothing very great to them. “But this God is our God!” (Ps 48:14). There is the comfort. That is why the apostle presents them with this description of him, namely, by breadth, and length, and depth, and height. It is as if he said: The High God is yours. The God who fills heaven and earth is yours. The God whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain is yours. Yes, the God whose works are wonderful and whose ways are past finding out is yours.

So consider the greatness that is for you, that takes your side, and that will always come in to help you against those who contend with you. It is my support, it is my relief, it is my comfort in all my troubles, and I would have it be yours too; and so it will be, when we live in the living faith of it. Nor should we let distrust in on this matter because we consider our own unworthiness, whether we draw it from the finiteness of our condition or from the foulness of our ways (Ps 46). It is true that several of God’s attributes, in their own nature, are set against sin and sinners. It is true, too, that even if we were righteous, they are so high that they could only look right over us. For it is a condescension for him even to look upon things in heaven; how much more, then, to open his eyes upon such as we are! Yet through the passion of Jesus Christ, they all agree in harmony in the salvation of our souls.

That is why God is said to be love (1 John 4). “God is love,” someone might say, “and justice too.” Yes, but his justice, together with his wisdom, power, holiness, and truth, is turned to love. Yes, it is turned to love toward those who are found in his Son, since there is nothing worthy of fault in his righteousness, which is put upon us. So then, as there is in God’s nature a length, and breadth, and depth, and height that is beyond all that we can think, so we should conclude that all of it is love to us for Christ’s sake. Then we should expand on it in our minds this way, and enlarge on it in our meditations, saying again and again to our low and trembling spirits: “It is high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know? the measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea” (Job 11:8-9).

But we will pass over generalities and speak more particularly.

Second, then, I will speak of something of their fullness, as they are fitted to suit and answer the whole state and condition of a Christian in this life. The words are boundless. We have a breadth, a length, a depth and a height mentioned here; but what breadth, what length, what depth, what height is not so much as hinted. So it is infiniteness that is suggested to us here, and an infiniteness that has engaged itself for us. For the apostle joins to it the words, And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge. In this way, then, it suits and answers a Christian’s condition while he is in this world, let that condition be what it will.

If his afflictions are broad, here is a breadth; if they are long, here is a length; if they are deep, here is a depth; and if they are high, here is a height. And I will say that nothing is more helpful, supporting or comforting to a Christian in a state of trial and temptation than to know that there is a breadth to answer a breadth, a length to answer a length, a depth to answer a depth, and a height to answer a height. That is why the apostle prays for this, namely, that the Ephesians might have understanding in these things: “That ye may know what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height.”

As for the largeness of the apostle’s heart in praying for this people, namely, “That they might be able to comprehend with all saints, what …,” we will speak of that afterward.

But first, let us speak to these four expressions: breadth, length, depth and height.

1. What is the breadth? This word is meant to show that God is all over, everywhere, spreading his wings (Deut 32:11-12) and stretching out his goodness to the utmost bounds (Gen 49:26) for the good of those who are his people.

In the sin of his people there is a breadth: a breadth that spreads over all, wherever a man looks. The sin of the saints is a spreading leprosy (Lev 13:12). Sin is a scab that spreads; it is a spreading plague; it knows no bounds (Lev 13:8, 57). Or, as David says, “I have seen the wicked spreading himself” (Ps 37:35). That is why it is compared to a cloud, to a thick cloud, that covers or spreads over the face of the whole sky. So a breadth is called for here, a breadth that can cover all, or else whatever is done is to no purpose.

Therefore, to answer this, we have a breadth here, a spreading breadth: “I spread my skirt over thee.” But how far? Even so far as to cover all: “I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness” (Ezek 16:8). Here now is a breadth that answers the spreading nature of the sin of this wretched one. Yes, it is a superabounding spreading, a spreading beyond, a spreading to cover. “Blessed is he whose sin is covered” (Ps 32:1): blessed is he whose spreading sin is covered by the mercy of God through Christ (Rom 4:4-7). This is the spreading cloud whose spreadings no one can understand (Job 36:29). “He spread a cloud for a covering, and fire to give light in the night” (Ps 105:39).

This breadth that is in God also overmatches the spreading and overspreading rage of men, which sometimes seems as if it would swallow up the whole church of God. You read of the rage of the king of Assyria, that there was a breadth in it, an overflowing breadth, filling “the breadth of thy land, O Immanuel” (Isa 8:8). But what follows? “Associate yourselves, O ye people” (you Assyrians), “and ye shall be broken in pieces; and give ear, all ye of far countries; gird yourselves and ye shall be broken in pieces. Take counsel together, and it shall come to nought; speak the word, and it shall not stand, for God is with us” (Isa 8:9-10). God will overmatch you and go beyond you.

So this word breadth, and what is the breadth, is set down here on purpose to help and relieve: that is, to show what support the knowledge of the overspreading grace of God through Christ gives to those who have it, let their trials be what they will. Alas! The sin of God’s children sometimes seems to overspread not only their flesh and the face of their souls, but the whole face of heaven. And what is the man to do now who is a stranger to this breadth mentioned in the text? Why, he must despair, lie down and die, and shut up his heart against all comfort, unless he, with his fellow Christians, can at least grasp what this breadth is, the breadth of mercy intended in this place. Therefore Paul, for the support of the Ephesians, prays that they may know “what is the breadth.”

This largeness of the heart and mercy of God toward his people is also signified by the spreading out of his hand to us in the invitations of the gospel. “I said,” he says, “Behold me, behold me … I have spread out my hands all the day unto a rebellious people … to a people that provoketh me continually” (Isa 65:1-3). “I have spread out my hands”: that is, I have opened my arms, as a mother tenderly does when she stoops to her child in the warm stirrings of her heart, clasps it up in them, kisses it, and puts it into her bosom.

For the spreading out of the hands or arms to embrace shows the breadth or largeness of God’s affections. In the same way, our spreading out our hands in prayer signifies the great sense we have of the spreading nature of our sins, and the great desires in us that God would be merciful to us (Ezra 9:5-7).

This word also answers to, or may fitly be set against, the wiles and temptations of the devil. He is that great and dogged Leviathan who spreads his “sharp-pointed things upon the mire” (Job 41:30). For however broad the spreading nature of our corruptions may be, he will find sharp-pointed things enough to stick in the mire of them to afflict us. These sharp-pointed things are what another place calls “fiery darts” (Eph 6:16), and he has an abundance of them, with which he can and will sorely prick and wound our spirits. Yes, some have found these things so sharp to their souls that they have pierced beyond expression. “When,” said Job, “I say, my bed shall comfort me, my couch shall ease my complaint; then thou scarest me with dreams, and terrifiest me through visions; so that my soul chooseth strangling, and death rather than my life” (Job 7:13-15).

But now, answering to the spreading of these sharp-pointed things, there is a superabounding breadth in the sovereign grace of God. Whoever sees and understands it, as the apostle prays we should, is helped at once. For he sees that this grace spreads itself, and is broader than either our mire or the sharp-pointed things the devil spreads on it to vex and afflict us: “It is broader than the sea” (Job 11:9).

This, then, is what those who see the spreading nature of sin, its leprosy and contagion, should meditate on: the broadness of the grace and mercy of God in Christ. This will balance and steady the soul. This will relieve and support the soul in and under the many misgiving and despondent thoughts we are subject to when we are afflicted with a sense of sin and of its abounding nature.

Shall another man pray for this, one who knew its goodness and benefit, and shall I not meditate on it? Shall I not exercise my mind about it? Yes, surely, for it is my duty; it is my privilege and mercy to do so. So when you see the spreading nature of your sin, let this be a reminder to you, so that you may not sink and die in your soul.

2. What is the breadth and length? As there is a breadth in this mercy and grace of God through Christ, so there is a length in it. This length is as large as the breadth, and it suits the condition of the child of God as much as the other does. For though sin is sometimes most afflicting to the conscience while the soul looks on its overspreading nature, it does not stop there. Often, through its power and prevalence, the soul is driven by it like a ship by a mighty tempest, or like a rolling thing before the whirlwind: driven, I say, from God and from all hope of his mercy, as far as the east is from the west, or as far as the ends of the world are apart. That is why the prophet supposes that for sin, and by sin, they may be driven from God to the utmost part of heaven (Deut 30:4). And that is a sad thing, a sad thing, I say, to a gracious man. “Why,” says the prophet to God, “art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?” (Ps 22:1).

Sometimes a man, yes, a man of God, is, as he perceives it, so far off from God that God can neither help him nor hear him; and this is a dismal state. “And thou hast removed my soul,” said the church, “far off from peace: I forgat prosperity” (Lam 3:17). This is sometimes the state of the godly. It is so not only with reference to their being removed by persecutors from the appointed ordinances and seasons of the gospel, which are their delight and the desire of their eyes, but also with reference to their faith and hope in their God. They think they are beyond the reach of his mercy. So it is in answer to this notion that the Lord asks, “Is my hand shortened at all that it cannot redeem?” (Isa 50:2). And again, “Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear” (Isa 59:1). Therefore he says again, “If any of them be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence will the Lord thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee” (Deut 30:4).

God has a long arm, and he can reach a great way farther than we can imagine he can (Neh 1:9). When we think his mercy is clean gone, and that we ourselves are free among the dead, and of the number he remembers no more, then he can reach us and cause us to stand before him again. He could reach Jonah, though in the belly of hell (Jonah 2), and he can reach you, even when you think your way is hidden from the Lord and your judgment passed over by your God.

There is a length to be wondered at, beyond apprehension or belief, in the arm of the strength of the Lord. And this is what the apostle intended by this word length: namely, to suggest what a reach there is in the mercy of God, how far it can extend itself. “If I take the wings of the morning,” said David, “and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me” (Ps 139:9-10). He says he will gather them from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south: that is, from the farthest corners.

This, therefore, should encourage those who for the present cannot stand, but flee before their guilt: those who feel no help or support, but who, as they think, are driven every day by the power of temptation still farther off from God, and from the hope of obtaining his mercy to their salvation. Poor creature, I will not ask you now how you came into this condition, or how long this has been your state. But I will say this before you, and I beg you to hear me: O the length of the saving arm of God! You are still within its reach.

Do not go about measuring arms with God, as some good men are apt to do. I mean, do not conclude that because you cannot reach God with your short stump, he therefore cannot reach you with his long arm. Look again: “Hast thou an arm like God?” (Job 40:9). Have you an arm like his for length and strength? When you cannot perceive that God is within the reach of your arm, it is fitting for you, then, to believe that you are within the reach of his; for it is long, and no one knows how long.

Again, is there such a length? Is there such a length in the arm of the Lord that he can reach those who have gone away as far as they could? Then this should encourage us to pray, and to hope for the salvation of any of our backslidden relatives, that God would reach out his arm after them, saying, “Awake … O arm of the Lord … art thou not it that hath cut Rahab, and wounded the dragon? Art thou not it which hath dried the sea, the waters of the great deep, that hath made the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over?” (Isa 51:9-10).

Awake, O arm of the Lord, and be stretched out as far as where my poor husband is, where my poor child is, or where my poor backslidden wife or dear relative is, and lay hold, fast hold. They have gone from you; but, O hope of Israel, fetch them again, and let them stand before you. I say, here in this word length is matter of encouragement for us to pray like this. For if the length of the reach of mercy is so great, and if this length is also for the benefit of those who may have gone far off from God (for those who are near have no need of it at present), then make good use of this advantage at the throne of grace for such people, that they may come to God again.

3. As there is a breadth and length here, so there is a depth: “What is the breadth, and length, and depth?” And this depth is also put in here on purpose to help us under a trial different from the two former. I told you that by the breadth the apostle suggests a remedy and help for us when we see our corruptions spreading like a leprosy; and by length he would show us that when sin has driven God’s elect to the farthest distance from him, his arm is still long enough to reach them and fetch them back again.

But, I say, as we have here a breadth and a length, so we also have a depth: “That ye may know what is the depth.” Christians sometimes have their sinking fits, and are as if they were always descending; or, as Heman says, “counted with them that go down into the pit” (Ps 88:4). Now to such people guilt is not so much a wind and a tempest as a load and a burden. The devil, and sin, and the curse of the law, and death have gotten onto the shoulders of this poor man and are treading him down, so that he may sink into his miry place and be swallowed up by it.

“I sink,” says David, “in deep mire, where there is no standing. I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me” (Ps 69:2). Yes, nothing was more common among the saints of old than this complaint: “Let neither the water flood overflow me, neither let the deep swallow me up, neither let the pit shut her mouth upon me” (Ps 69:14-15). Heman also says, “Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves” (Ps 88:6-7). That is why the psalmist says again, “Deep calleth unto deep, at the noise of thy water spouts: all thy waves, and thy billows are gone over me” (Ps 42:7).

Deep calleth unto deep: what is that? Why, it is expressed in the verse before: “O God,” he says, “my soul is cast down within me.” “Down”: that is, deep into the jaws of distrust and fear. And so: Lord, my soul in this depth of sorrow calls for help to your depth of mercy. For though I am sinking and going down, I am not so low but that your mercy is still underneath me. In your compassion, open those everlasting arms (Deut 33:27) and catch the one who has no help or support in himself; for so it is with one who is falling into a well or a dungeon.

Now mark this. As these texts set forth the sinking condition of the godly man, of a man whom sin and Satan are treading down into the deep, so in our text, which I am speaking to at this time, we have a depth that can more than counterbalance these deeps, set forth with a hearty prayer that we may know it. The deeps, or depths of calamity, into which the godly may fall may be as deep as hell, and I think they can be no deeper. Yet this is the comfort, and it is for the comfort of those godly ones who are sinking like this: the mercy of God for them lies deeper. “It is deeper than hell, what canst thou know?” (Job 11:8). And this is what made Paul unafraid of this depth: “I am persuaded,” he says, “that neither … height nor depth shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:38-39).

But he could by no means have been persuaded of this had he not believed that mercy lies deeper for the godly, to help them, than all other depths can lie to destroy them. This is what he stands and wonders at, saying, “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God” (Rom 11:33). That is, the depth to find out a way to save his people, despite all the deep schemes the enemy has, and may yet invent, to make us come short of home.

This is also, as I take it, what is wrapped up in the blessing with which Jacob blessed his son Joseph. “God shall bless thee,” he says, “with blessings of heaven above,” and with the “blessings of the deep that lieth under” (Gen 49:25). He had ground to pronounce this blessing as much from his observation of God’s good dealings with Joseph as from a spirit of prophecy. For he saw that Joseph lived, and had become a flourishing bough by a wall, after the archers had done their worst to him (Gen 49:22-24). Moses also blessed God for blessing Joseph in this way, and blessed his portion to him, counting it sufficient for his help in all afflictions. “Blessed,” he says, “of the Lord, be his land, for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and for the deep that coucheth beneath” (Deut 33:13).

I do not believe these blessings are confined to temporal or carnal things; they reach to things spiritual and divine, and they chiefly concern the soul and its eternal good. Now mark this: he tells us here that the blessings of the deep couch beneath. Couch, that is, lie close, so as hardly to be noticed by the one who would gladly see that he himself has not sunk below these arms that are beneath him. But that, as I said, is hard for the one who is sinking like this to notice, since, as he now painfully feels, all God’s waves and his billows are rolling over him.

However, whether he sees it or not (for this blessing lies couched), there it is, and there it will be, even though one should sink as deep as hell. And hence they are said to be “everlasting arms” that are “underneath” (Deut 33:27): that is, arms that are long and strong, that can reach to the bottom, and beyond, of all the misery and distress Christians are subject to in this life.

Indeed, mercy seems to be asleep when we are sinking; for then it is as if all things were careless of us. But it is only like a couching lion: it will awake in time to help us (Ps 44:23, 26; Mark 4:36-39). And since this is the very term used of the lion in his den, it may be meant to show that God, like a lion, will arise at the fittest season for the help and deliverance of a sinking people. That is why, when he is said to set himself to deliver his people, he comes as a roaring lion: “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, he shall stir up jealousy like a man of war: he shall cry, yea, roar; he shall prevail against his enemies” (Isa 42:13).

However that may be, here is a depth against the depth that is against us, let that depth be what it will. If it is the depth of misery, the depth of mercy is sufficient. If it is the depth of hellish scheming, the depth both of the wisdom and knowledge of God will go beyond it and prevail.

This, therefore, is worthy of the consideration of all sinking souls, of the souls that feel themselves descending into the pit. Such a thing as this is experienced among the godly. Come to some of them when they are tempted, whenever you like, and they will tell you that they have no ground to stand on: their feet have slipped, their foundation is removed (Ps 11:3), and they feel themselves sinking as into a pit that has no bottom. They sink inwardly, not for lack of something to relieve the body, but for lack of some spiritual cordial to support the mind. “I went down to the bottoms of the mountains,” said Jonah, “the earth with her bars was about me for ever … my soul fainted within me” (Jonah 2:6-7).

Now, if such people would consider that underneath them, even at the bottom, there lies a blessing, or that in this deep into which they are descending there lies a delivering mercy, couching to catch them and to save them from sinking forever, this would be a relief to them, and would help them to hope for good.

Again, as this, if the sinking ones considered it well, would give them support and relief, so it is by the power of this that those who have been sinking before now have been lifted up, and raised above their castings down again. Some of those who have been in the pit are now on Mount Zion, with the harps of God in their hands and the song of the Lamb in their mouths. But how is it that they are there? Why, David, by his own deliverance, shows you the reason. “For great is thy mercy towards me,” he says, “and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell” (Ps 86:13). And again, “He brought me up also out of an horrible pit” (a pit of noise, a pit in which was the noise of devils, and of my heart answering them with distrust and fear), “out of the miry clay” (into which I not only sank, but by which I was held from getting up; but he brought me up), “and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God” (Ps 40:2-3).

But let me here give, if I may, a timely caution to those who think they stand on their feet. Do not give way to falling because everlasting arms are underneath; take heed of that. God can let you fall into mischief; he can let you fall and not help you up. Do not tempt God, lest he cast you away indeed. I fear there are many who have presumed on this mercy, who sink down beneath in this way and have thrown themselves from their pinnacles into vanity, on the empty notion that they will be lifted up again. Yet God will leave them to die there, because their fall came from willfulness rather than weakness, from stubbornness and desperate resolve rather than from any lack of means and helps to keep them from it.

4. As there is a breadth, and length, and depth in this mercy and grace of God through Christ toward his people, so there is also a height: “That ye may comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height” (Eph 3:18). There are things that are high as well as things that are low, things that are above us as well as things that are under, that distress God’s people. It is said that when Noah was a preacher of righteousness, “there were giants in the earth in those days” (Gen 6:4). And these, as I take it, were some of the heights set against Noah. Yes, they were the very dads and fathers of all that monstrous brood that followed in the world in that day. Of this sort were those who so frightened and terrified Israel when they were about to go in and inherit the land of promise. The men who were tall as the cedars and strong as the oaks frightened them. In their own sight, compared with these high ones, they were only grasshoppers. This, then, was their discouragement (Num 13:31-33; Deut 2:10; Deut 9:2).

Besides these, they also had high walls, walls as high as heaven, and these walls were there on purpose to keep Israel out of his possession. See how it is expressed: “The people is greater and taller than we, the cities are great and walled up to heaven: and moreover, we have seen the sons of the Anakims there” (Deut 1:28). One of these, Goliath by name, how he frightened the children of Israel in the days of Saul! How the sight of him made them scuttle together in heaps before him (1 Sam 17)! By these giants and these high walls God’s children are sorely distressed to this day, because they stand at the crossroads to cut Israel off from his possession.

But now, to support us against all these, and to encourage us to take heart in spite of all these things, there is for us a height in God. He has made his Son higher than the kings of the earth (Ps 89:27). His word also is settled forever in heaven, and so it must be higher than their walls (Ps 119:89). God also says in another place, “If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter; for he that is higher than the highest regardeth, and there be higher than they” (Eccl 5:8). It was this that kept Paul from fearing height, or things present, or things to come (Rom 8:38-39).

But again, as there are these things standing or lying in our way, so there is another sort of heights more mischievous than these, and they are the fallen angels. They are called “spiritual wickedness,” or wicked spirits, “in high places” (Eph 6:12). For God has allowed them for a time to take principality and power to themselves, and so they have become the rulers of the darkness of this world. By these we are tempted, sifted, threatened, opposed, and undermined. By these, too, snares, pits, holes, and who knows what else are made and laid for us, in case by some means or other we may be destroyed. Yes, and we certainly would be, were it not for the rock that is higher than they. “But he that cometh from heaven is above all!” (John 3:31). These are the ones our King has taken captive, and over whose necks he has ridden in triumph in his chariots of salvation. These are the ones, together with all the others, whose most devilish designs he can wield and turn and make work together for the advantage of his ransomed people (Rom 8:28). There is a height, an infinitely overtopping height, in the mercy and goodness of God for us against them.

There are heights also that build themselves up in us, and these must not go unnoticed. Yes, there are a great many of them, and they place themselves so as to keep the saving knowledge of God out of our hearts, if they possibly can. That is why these high things are said to exalt themselves against the knowledge of God (2 Cor 10:5). They often plague, afflict, and frighten Christian men and women more than anything else.

It is from these that our faith and our spiritual understanding of God and his Christ are opposed and contradicted, and from these too that we are so inclined to swerve from right doctrine into destructive opinions. It is from these that we are so easily persuaded to call into question our former experience of God’s goodness toward us, and from these that our minds are so often clouded and darkened that we cannot see far off. These would betray us into the hands of fallen angels and of men, and we could in no way help or deliver ourselves, were it not for one who is higher. These are the dark mountains on which our feet would certainly stumble and fall, were it not for one who can leap and skip over these mountains of division and come in to us (Song 2:8, 17).

Further, there is also a height that is plain to our senses, and when our corrupted reason deals with it, it greatly shakes our minds. That is the height and exceeding distance of heaven from us, and of us from it. “Is not God in the height of heaven? and behold the height of the stars, how high they are?” (Job 22:12). That is why heaven is called the place for height (Prov 25:3). Also, when Ahaz is told to ask with reference to heaven, he is told to ask it in the height, the height above (Isa 7:11). Now reason says, “How will I ever get there?” And it says so especially when a good man is at his farthest distance from it, which is when he is in the grave. Now I say, every height is hard going for anyone loaded down with a burden. And for those who are weighed down with the guilt of sin, the hardest height of all is the heaven of heavens, where God is, and where his people have their resting place. Besides this, the last thing that befalls us, namely death, as I said before, makes this heaven seem all the more out of reach in my thoughts while I live.

Christ indeed could mount up (Acts 1:9), but I, poor I, how will I get there? Elijah indeed had a chariot sent to carry him there, and he went up in it into that holy place (2 Kgs 2:11); but I, poor I, how will I get there? Enoch is there, because God took him (Gen 5:24); but as for me, how will I get there? This is how some have mourned. And although distrust of God’s power to accomplish this is by no means to be smiled on, still I think the unconcern of professing Christians about it shows that they are not giving it serious thought.

I know the ready answer: Get Christ and go to heaven. But I think the height of the place, and the glory of the state we are to enjoy there, should concern us a little, at least enough to make us wonder, as we think on it, that the time is coming when we must mount up there. And since there are so many heights between this place, between us, and that, it should make us marvel at the heights of the grace and mercy of God, by which means have been provided to bring us there. And I believe that this thing, this very thing, is included here by the apostle when he prays for the Ephesians that they might know the height.

I think How shall we get there? will still stick in my mind. “I will ascend,” says one, “above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High” (Isa 14:14). And I, says another, will set my nest among the stars of heaven (Obad 4). Well, but what of all this? If heaven has gates and they are shut, how will you get in there? Though such people should climb up to heaven, God will bring them down from there (Amos 9:2). So I still say, how shall we get in there?

Why, for those who are godly, there is the power of God, the merits of Christ, the help of angels, and the testimony of a good conscience to bring them there. And whoever does not have the help of all these, let him do what he can, will never get there. Not that all these go to make up the height intended in the text, for the height there is only what is in God through Christ toward us. But the angels are God’s servants for that purpose (Luke 16:22; Heb 1:14), and none with evil consciences enter in there (Ps 15:1; Ps 24:3-4). What? “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? be not deceived” (1 Cor 6:9). Such people have no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God (Eph 5:5).

This, then, should teach us that in God there is a power able to subdue all things to himself. In bringing many things about there seems to be an utter impossibility: that a virgin should conceive in her womb, as a virgin, and bring a Son into the world; that the body that has turned to dust should arise and ascend into the highest heaven (Phil 3:21). These things, with many more, seem utterly impossible. But there is what is called the power of God, by which he is able to make all things bend to his will, and to make every obstruction give way to what he pleases. God is high above all things and can do whatever pleases him.

But since he can do so, someone may ask, why does he allow this and that thing to appear, to act, and to do things so horribly contrary to his word? I answer, he permits many things so that he may show his wrath and make his power known, and so that all the world may see how he checks and overrules the vilest and most unruly things and can make them serve his holy will. And how would the breadth, the length, the depth, and the height of the love and mercy of God in Christ toward us be made to appear, as they do in all things, unless there were allowed to be breadths, lengths, depths, and heights to oppose them? So these oppositions are permitted for this very reason: that the greatness of the wisdom, the power, the mercy, and the grace of God to us in Christ might appear and be made plain to us.

This, therefore, calls on Christians to consider wisely the doings of their God. How many opposing breadths, lengths, depths, and heights Israel met with on their journey from Egypt to Canaan! And all to convince them of their own weakness, and also of the power of their God. And those who wisely considered his doings there reaped the benefit of it. “Come, behold the works of the Lord toward me,” every Christian may say. “He has set a Savior against sin, a heaven against a hell, light against darkness, good against evil, and the breadth, and length, and depth, and height of the grace that is in himself, for my good, against all the power and strength and force and subtlety of every enemy.”

This also, as I hinted just before, shows both the power of those who hate us and our inability to resist. The power set against us no one can crush and break but God, for it is the power of devils, of sin, of death, and of hell. But we, for our part, are crushed before the moth, being a shadow, a vapor, and a wind that passes away (Job 4:19). Oh, how we should, and how we would, if only our eyes were awake, stand and wonder at the preservations, the deliverances, the salvations, and the benefits that surround us daily, while so many mighty evils seek every day to swallow us up like the grave!

See how the golden psalm of David puts it: “Be merciful unto me, O God; for man would swallow me up; he fighting daily oppresseth me. Mine enemies would daily swallow me up: for they be many that fight against me, O thou most high” (Ps 56:1-2). That is how it begins. And he concludes it this way: “Thou hast delivered my soul from death: wilt not thou deliver my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living?” (Ps 56:13).

By this also we see the reason why it is so impossible for man or angel to persuade unbelievers to come in and close with Christ. It is because there is a breadth they cannot get over, a length they cannot get beyond, a depth they cannot pass, and heights that so block their view of glory, and of the way to it, that they cannot be drawn there. And that nothing can remove these but those that are in God and are set against them, namely the breadth, and length, and depth, and height expressed in the text, is an undoubted truth to everyone who has been awakened.

One word of caution I would give here to anyone who loves his own soul, and then we will go on to what comes next. Since there is a height plain to the senses, and that height must be overcome before anyone can enter into eternal life, let your heart take care that you go the right way to get over this height, so that you do not miss the delectable plains and the pleasures that are above. Now, there is nothing high enough to overtop this height except Jacob’s ladder, and that can do it. That ladder, while its foot stands on the earth, reaches with its top to the gate of heaven. This is the ladder by which angels ascend there, and this is the ladder by which you may ascend there. “And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it” (Gen 28:12).

This ladder is Jesus Christ, the Son of Man, as is clear from the evangelist John (John 1:51). Its being said to stand on the earth shows that he took hold of man, who is of the earth, and in this way laid a foundation for his salvation. Its being said that the top reached up to heaven shows that the divine nature was joined to the human, and by that means he was made a complete Savior in every way.

Now concerning this ladder, it is said that heaven was open where it stood, to show that by him there is entrance into life. It is also said concerning this ladder that the Lord stood there, at the top, above it, saying, “I am the Lord God of Abraham” (Gen 28:13), to show his hearty and willing welcome of those who ascend the height of his sanctuary this way. Christ explains all this further by saying, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life, no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). Look to yourself, then, that you truly and in the right manner embrace this ladder; then he will draw you up there after him (John 12:32). All the rungs of this ladder are sound and fitly placed. Not one of them is set farther off than you can reach by faith, climbing step by step, until you come to the highest step, from which you may step in at the celestial gate where your soul desires to dwell.

Take my caution, then, and be wary: no one can come there except by him. There, I say, to be accepted; there, to dwell, and there to abide with joy forever.

“That ye … may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge” (Eph 3:18-19).

Having spoken in this way of the breadth, and length, and depth, and height that is in God’s mercy by Christ toward us, we will now come more directly to the apostle’s prayer for these Ephesians with reference to it, namely, that they might be able to comprehend with all saints what these are.

1. First, as to the ability he prays for, so that they may be capable of doing this: “That ye may be able.” The weakness assumed here to hinder them from comprehending in this way no doubt lay in their grace as well as in their nature. For in both, even in those who are Christians, there is great inability unless they are mightily strengthened by the Holy Spirit. Nature’s ability depends on the graces, and the ability of the graces depends on the mighty help of the Spirit of God. So, just as nature itself, where grace is absent, sees nothing, so nature by grace sees only weakly, if that grace is not strengthened with all might by the Spirit of grace.

The breadths, lengths, depths, and heights mentioned here are mysteries, and in all their operations they work in wonderfully mysterious ways. So much so that many times, though they are all busily engaged for this or that child of God, the children of God themselves see nothing of them. As Christ said to Peter, “What I do thou knowest not now” (John 13:7), so it may be said to many in whom the grace and mercy of God in Christ is working. They do not know, they do not understand, what it is, or what the end of such dealings of God toward them will be. So they too say, as Peter said to Christ, “Dost thou wash my feet? … thou shalt never wash my feet” (John 13:6-8).

Yes, and when some light breaks in on them to convince them of this folly, yet if it is not very distinct and clear, making the person know the true cause, nature, and end of God’s doing this or that, they swerve with Peter just as far the other way (John 13:9-10). “They have not known my ways”: their not knowing God’s ways and his methods with them in this world was what caused Israel always to err in their hearts (Heb 3:10), and to set themselves against each and every one of these breadths, lengths, depths, and heights whenever they were put through any of them in the wilderness.

And the reason, as I said before, is that they are very mysterious in their workings. For they work by, on, and against oppositions, for the help and salvation of his people and in order to bring it about. Also (as was hinted a while ago), so that the power and glory of this breadth and length, and the rest, of the mercy and grace of God may all the more show its excellence and sufficiency for our deliverance, we seem by him to be handed over completely to the breadths, lengths, depths, and heights that oppose us and utterly seek our ruin. That is why at such times nothing of these breadths, lengths, depths, or heights can be seen, except by those who are very well skilled in God’s mysterious methods in his gracious dealings with his people. “Who will bring me into the strong city,” and “wilt not thou, O God, which hadst cast us off? and thou, O God, which didst not go out with our armies?” (Ps 60:9-10) is a lesson too hard for just any Christian to say over in faith.

And what was it that made Jonah say, when he was in the belly of hell, “Yet I will look again toward thy holy temple” (Jonah 2:4), but the good skill he had in understanding the mystery of these breadths, and lengths, and depths, and heights of God, and of the way he works by them? Read the text at large: “Thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas, and the floods compassed me about. All thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple” (Jonah 2:3-4).

These and similar sayings are easily played with by a preacher in the pulpit, especially if he has a little notion of things. But as for the difficulty and strait into which those people are brought from whose mouths such things or words are wrung by the force of the labyrinths they have fallen into, such preachers experience nothing of these, and so are utterly strangers to them.

Whoever, then, is able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height must be a good interpreter of providences, and must see the way and the workings of God by them. Now there are providences of two sorts, seemingly good and seemingly bad. And these usually do as Jacob did when he blessed the sons of Joseph: they cross hands, and lay the blessing where we would not. “And when Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand upon the head of Ephraim, it displeased him” (Gen 48:17). I say, there are providences to which we would have the blessings tied, but they are not. These are the providences that smile on the flesh, that is, those that drop into our lap health, wealth, plenty, ease, friends, and an abundance of this world’s goods. For these (as the name Manasseh signifies) have in them a tendency to make us forget our toil, our low estate, and where we came from (Gen 41:51); but the great blessing is not in them.

There are providences, again, that take away from us whatever is desirable to the flesh, such as sickness, losses, crosses, persecution, and affliction. And usually in these, though they make us shudder whenever they come on us, a blessing lies hidden and is ready to help us. For God, as the name Ephraim signifies, makes us “fruitful in the land of our affliction” (Gen 41:52). So in blessing his people he lays his hands across, guiding them knowingly, and lays the chief blessing on the head of Ephraim, that is, in that providence which sanctifies affliction. Abel! What was he, to Eve’s reasoning, compared with Cain? Rachel called Benjamin the son of her sorrow, but Jacob knew how to give him a better name (Gen 35:18). Jabez too, though his mother named him so because, it seems, she bore him with more than ordinary sorrow, was yet more honorable, more godly, than his brothers (1 Chr 4:9-10).

He who has skill to judge providences rightly has great ability to comprehend with other saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height. But he who lacks skill in discerning them is only a child in his judgment of those high and mysterious things. And that is why some will suck honey out of the very thing at which others tremble for fear it will poison them. I have often been made to say, “Sorrow is better than laughter; and the house of mourning better than the house of mirth” (Eccl 7:3-5). And I have still more often seen that the afflicted are always the best sort of Christians. Here is a man who is never well, never prospering, never anything but under afflictions, disappointments, and sorrows: why, this man, if he is a Christian, is one of the best of men. “They that go down to the sea … that do business in great waters, these see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep” (Ps 107:23-24).

And it is from this, for all I know, that James urges the brother of high degree to rejoice that he is made low. And he gives the reason: because the fashion of the world perishes, and the rich man fades away in his ways, but the tempted man, the one who endures temptation, is blessed (Jas 1:10-12). Now, I know these things are not excellent in themselves, nor to be desired for any profit they can yield. But God uses them, as a tutor or instructor, to make known to those who are exercised by them so much of himself as to make them understand that wealth of his goodness which is seldom opened up to the sons of men by other means. That is why it is said that the afterward of affliction yields the peaceable fruits of righteousness to those who are exercised by it (Heb 12:11).

The sum is this: these breadths, and lengths, and depths, and heights of God are to be discerned. Some who are good discern more and some less of them, and of how they are working and putting themselves forth in every providence, in every change, in every turn of the wheel that passes by us in this world. I do not doubt that some now living have been able to say that the days of affliction have been the best for them. And they could, if it were lawful, pray always to be in affliction, if only God would do to them as he did when his hand was last on them. For by these afflictions he caused his light to shine; or as Job has it, “Thou huntest me as a fierce lion: and again thou showest thyself marvelously upon me” (Job 10:16). See also the writing of Hezekiah, and read what profit he found in afflictions (Isa 38).

But again, these breadths, lengths, depths, and heights have by their very nature such glory in themselves that weak eyes cannot discern it well or keep it in view. Whoever can look on these great things and not be struck blind by them needs an eye like an eagle’s, that can look at the sun. You see how Saul fared when he was going to Damascus (Acts 9). But Stephen could stand and look up steadfastly into heaven, and that too when, like Jonah, he was going into the deep (Acts 7). But I have done with this, and will proceed.

2. Second: “That ye may be able to comprehend” (Eph 3:18). Although apprehending is included in comprehending, to comprehend is more. To comprehend is to know a thing fully, or to reach the whole of it. But here we must make a distinction and say that there is a comprehending that is absolute and a comprehending that is comparative. We are not speaking here of comprehending absolutely, or perfectly, for in this place the apostle could not desire that as the thing he prays for. It is utterly impossible to know perfectly whatever is in the breadths, lengths, depths, and heights spoken of here, whether you call them mercies, judgments, or the ways of God with men. “How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!” (Rom 11:33). Or if you take them to signify his love, as you see I am inclined to do, why, you read of that love in this same place, that it is love “which passes knowledge” (Eph 3:19). So if the apostle should by this term conclude or suggest that what he here calls breadths, lengths, depths, or heights might be fully or perfectly understood and known, he would contradict not only other Scriptures but himself, in one and the selfsame breath.

Therefore it must be understood comparatively; that is, as he says, with others, or as much as others, as much as any, even “with all saints”: “That ye may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height.” It is as if he said: I wish you were as able to understand, to know, and to find out these things as anyone ever was, and to know, with the very best of saints, “the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge.” As has been hinted before, there are degrees of knowledge of these things; some know more, some less. But the apostle prays that these Ephesians might see, know, and understand as much of it as the best, or as anyone under heaven.

1. And this, in the first place, shows us the love of a minister of Jesus Christ. A minister’s love for his flock is seen in his praying for them. That is why Paul in his letters commonly lets the churches know, either at the beginning or at the end or both, that he often prayed heartily to God for them (Rom 16:20, 24; 1 Cor 16:23; Gal 6:18; Eph 1:16; Phil 1:4; Col 1:3; 1 Thess 1:2; 1 Tim 6:21; 2 Tim 4:22). And not only that, but he also specifies the mercies, blessings, and benefits that he earnestly begged of God for them (2 Cor 13:7; 2 Thess 1:11).

2. But, secondly, this implies that great benefits come to Christians by comprehending these things. Yes, it implies that something very special is ministered to us by this knowledge of them. Here I will touch on a few of them.

(1) Whoever arrives at some competent knowledge of these things will understand more thoroughly the greatness, the wisdom, the power, and so on, of the God who is above. For by these expressions the attributes of God are set forth to us. And although I have spoken of them so far under the idea of grace and mercy, that was not because I concluded that they exclude the expression of his other attributes. It was because all his attributes, as it were, turn into loving methods in the wheel of their heavenly motion toward the children of God. That is why it is said, “God is love” (1 John 4:16), and “God is light” (1 John 1:5). God is what he is for his own glory and for the good of those who fear him. God! Why, God, in the breadth, length, depth, and height intended here, comprehends the whole world (Col 1:17). The whole world is in him, for he is before, above, beyond, and round about all things. That is why it is said that the heavens, for all their breadth, are only his span; that he gathers the wind in his fists (Prov 30:4); that he measures the waters in the hollow of his hand, and weighs the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance (Isa 40:12). Yes, that “all nations before him are as nothing, and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity” (Isa 40:17). That is why we are said to live and move in him (Acts 17:28), and why he is beyond all searching out.

I will add one word more. Although there is such a revelation of him in his Word, in the book of creatures, and in the book of providences, yet the Scripture says, “Lo, these are parts of his ways: but how little a portion is heard of him?” (Job 26:14). So great is God, above all that we have read, heard, or seen of him, whether in the Bible, in heaven or earth, in the sea, or in anything else that can be understood. But now, that a poor mortal, a lump of sinful flesh, or, as the Scripture puts it, poor dust and ashes, should be in the favor of such a God, in his heart, and wrapped up in the compassions of such a God! O amazing! O astonishing thought! And yet “This God is our God for ever and ever; and He will be our guide even unto death” (Ps 48:14).

It is said of our God that “he humbleth himself when he beholds things in heaven.” How much more, then, when he opens his eyes upon man; but most of all when he makes it, so to speak, his business to visit man every morning and to try him every moment, having set his heart upon him and being determined to set him also among his princes. “The Lord is high above all nations, and his glory above the heavens. Who is like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, Who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven, and in the earth! He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill; that he may set him with princes, even with the princes of his people” (Ps 113:4-8).

(2) If this God is our God, or if our God is such a God, and if we could only attain to that knowledge of the breadth, and length, and depth, and height that is in him, as the apostle prays and desires here that we may, we should never be afraid of anything we meet with, or of anything that assaults us in this world. The great God, the Maker of all things, takes the part of those who fear him and who, out of the love and respect they bear him, commit themselves to walk in his ways. So such people may boldly say, “The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me” (Heb 13:6). Would it not be amazing to see a man surrounded by chariots and horses and weapons for his defense, and yet afraid of being blasted by a sparrow or overrun by a grasshopper? Why, “It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and” to whom “the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers” (Isa 40:22); that is the God of the people who are lovers of Jesus Christ. Therefore we should not fear them.

To fear man is to forget God; and to be careless in a time of danger is to forget God’s ordinance. What, then? Why, let us fear God and diligently keep his way, with whatever prudence and regard we can for our own preservation and for the preservation of what we have. And if, while we are doing this, our God delivers us and what we have into the hands of those who hate us, let us laugh, and be fearless and free of care, not minding now to do anything else but to stand up for him against the workers of iniquity. Let us fully conclude that both we and our enemies are in the hand of him who loves his people, and who will certainly render a reward to the wicked after he has sufficiently tried us by their means. “The great God that formed all things both rewardeth the fool, and rewardeth transgressors” (Prov 26:10).

(3) Another thing that the knowledge the apostle prays for will minister to us, if we attain it, is a holy fear and reverence of this great God in our souls, both because he is great and because he is wise and good (Jer 10:7). “Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name?” (Rev 15:4).

Greatness should beget fear; greatness should beget reverence. Now who is so great as our God? And so, who is to be feared like him! He is also wise, and will not be deceived by anyone. “He will bring evil, and not call back his words, but will rise against the house of evil-doers, and against the help of them that work iniquity” (Isa 31:2). Most people deal with God as if he were not wise, as if he either did not know the wickedness of their hearts and ways, or else did not know how to get even with them for it. Yet, alas, he is wise in heart and mighty in power. And although he will not afflict without cause, he will not let wickedness go unpunished. This, therefore, should make us fear. He is also good, and this should make us serve him with fear. Oh, that a great God should be a good God; a good God to an unworthy and undeserving people, to a people who continually do what they can to provoke the eyes of his glory! This should make us tremble. He is fearful in service, fearful in praises.

The breadth, and length, and depth, and height of his outgoings toward the children of men should also beget in us a very great fear and dread of his majesty. When the prophet saw the height of the wheels, he said they were “dreadful” (Ezek 1:18), and cried out to them, “O wheel!” (Ezek 10:13). His judgments also are a great deep (Ps 36:6), and there is no “searching of his understanding” (Isa 40:28). He knows how to bring his wheel upon us, and to make our table a snare, a trap, and a stumbling block to us (Isa 8:14; Rom 11:8-10). He knows how to make his Son a rock of offense to us, and his gospel a savor of death unto death to us (2 Cor 2:15-16). He knows how to choose delusions for us (Isa 66:4; 2 Thess 2:11-12), and to lead us forth with the workers of iniquity (Ps 125:5). He can outwit and outdo us, and prevail against us forever (Job 14:20). Therefore we should be afraid and fear before him, for our own good and the good of those who are ours forever. Yes, it is for these purposes, among others, that the apostle prays like this for this people. For comprehending these things balances the heart and keeps it on an even course. This yields comfort; this gives encouragement; this begets fear and reverence of God in our hearts.

(4) This knowledge will make us willing for him to be our God; yes, it will also make us abide by that willingness. Jacob said with a vow, “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God: And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God’s house: and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee” (Gen 28:20-22). In this way he considered the greatness of God. Supposing that God was what he had heard from his father that he was, he resolved to choose him for his God, to worship him, and to give him the honor due to him as God. How the king of Babylon set God above all gods, when only a few sparkling rays from him had shone on that king! He calls him “a God of gods” (Dan 2:47). He prefers him above all gods, and charges all peoples and nations to do nothing amiss against him (Dan 3:28-29). He calls him “the most high” God, the God “that liveth for ever”; he confesses that he does whatever he will in heaven and earth; and he ends by praising and extolling him (Dan 4). We naturally love greatness. And when the glorious beauty of the King of glory is made manifest to us and we behold it, we shall say as Joshua did: Let all men do as seems good to them, but I and my house will serve the Lord (Josh 24:15).

When the apostle Paul sought to win the Athenians to God, he set him forth before them in terms that speak of his greatness, calling him (and rightly) “God that made the world, and all things: … the Lord of heaven and earth; … One that giveth to all life and breath, and all things”; One who is near to everyone; “he in whom we live, and move, and have our being”; God who has made of one blood all nations of men, and has determined the times before appointed and the bounds of their habitation, and so on (Acts 17:24-28). These things speak of the greatness of God, and they captivate thoughtful people. Yes, these very Athenians, while they were still ignorant of him, built an altar to him from the dim hints they had about him by natural light, and put this singular inscription on it: “To the unknown God” (Acts 17:23). This showed that, after their own fashion, they had some kind of reverence for him. But how much more when they came to know him, and to believe that God, in all his greatness, had pledged himself to be theirs, and to bring them to himself, so that in time they might be partakers of his glory!

(5) The more a person knows or understands of the greatness of God toward him, expressed here in terms of unsearchable breadth, length, depth, and height, the better he will be able to conceive in his heart of the excellent glory and greatness of the things that are laid up in heaven for those who fear him. Those who know nothing of this greatness know nothing of those things. Those who think wrongly of this greatness think wrongly of them. Those who know only a little of this greatness know only a little of them. But whoever is able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height is best able to conceive of them, and consequently to judge their true worth and blessed glory.

This is evident to reason, and experience also confirms it. For as for those dark souls who know nothing of his greatness, they mock those who, through the splendor of the glory, are captivated and carried away after God. And those whose judgments are corrupted, and who are thereby made like drunkards, so that they judge things foolishly, step, as it were, in the same steps as the others, and imagine vain things about it. Moreover, we shall see that those little-spirited Christians (though Christians indeed) who are acquainted only in a small measure with this God, and with the breadths, and lengths, and depths, and heights that are in him, are taken only a little with the glory and blessedness they are to go to when they die. That is why they are neither so mortified to this world, so dead to sin, so self-denying, so delighted in the book of God, nor so earnest in their desires to be acquainted with the heights and depths that are in it. No, this is reserved only for those who are devoted to it, who have been acquainted with God in a measure beyond what your narrow-spirited Christians understand.

Most saints lack enlargement of heart in these things, as those at Corinth did, and those at Ephesus too. Therefore, just as Paul bids the one and prays for the other to be enlarged and to have great knowledge in these things, so we should, to answer such love, through desire separate ourselves from earthly things, so that we may seek and occupy ourselves with all wisdom (Prov 18:1). Christ says, “If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine” (John 7:17; Isa 28:9). Oh, that we were indeed enlarged in these breadths, and lengths, and depths, and heights of God, as the apostle desired the Ephesians might be!

(6) Then those great truths, the coming of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment, would neither seem so much like fables nor be so far off our hearts as they now seem and are (1 Cor 15:35). For a thorough belief in them depends on knowing the abilities that are in God to perform what he has said about them. That is why your inferior sort of Christians live as if none of these things were at hand. And that, again, is why they are so soon shaken in mind about them when they are tempted by the devil or briskly assaulted by deceivers. But this comes to pass so that what is written may be fulfilled: “And while the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept” (Matt 25:1-7). Surely the meaning is that they were asleep about his coming, the resurrection, and the judgment, and consequently had lost much of that knowledge of God which, had they retained it, would have kept these truths upon their hearts with power. The Corinthians were terribly decayed here, though some more than others. That is why Paul, when he treats this doctrine, bids them “awake to righteousness,” and not sin, telling them that some among them did not have the knowledge of God (1 Cor 15:34). To be sure, they did not have such a knowledge of God as would keep them steady in the faith of these things (1 Cor 15:51).

Now the knowledge of the things mentioned above, that is, “this comprehending knowledge,” will make these things great, bring them near, and make them believed as the greatest of God’s truths are believed. And the power of believing them is to make a person die daily.

(7) Therefore, another advantage that flows from this knowledge is that it makes the next world desirable. It does so not merely as it is with those lean souls who desire it only as the thief desires the judge’s favor, so that he may be saved from the gallows. Rather, those who have this knowledge desire it out of the love they have for God and for the beauties of the house he dwells in, and so that they may be rid of this world, which to them is like a dark dungeon. The knowledge of God that people claim to have may easily be judged by whether their hearts and lives answer to it or not. Where is the man who groans earnestly to be gone to God, who counts this life a confinement, who says what a sick man of my acquaintance said when his friend at his bedside prayed to God to spare his life? “No, no,” he said, “don’t pray that; for it is better to be dissolved and be gone.” Christians should show the world how they believe, not by words on paper, not by showy and flourishing notions (Jas 2:18), but by the desires they have to be gone; and the proof that these desires are true is a life in heaven while we are on earth (Phil 3:20-21). I know words are cheap, but a dram of grace is worth all the world. But where, as I said, shall it be found? Not among carnal people, not among weak Christians, but among those, and those only, who enjoy a great measure of Paul’s wish here.

And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge (Eph 3:19).

But to come now to the second part of the text. These words deal mainly with the love of Christ, who is the Son of God. We have already spoken briefly of God, and so now we will speak of his Son as well. These words are part of the prayer mentioned before, and they have something of the same strain in them. In the first part, the apostle prays that they might comprehend what cannot by any means be absolutely comprehended. And here he prays that something might be known which, in the same breath, he says passeth knowledge: namely, the love of Christ. “And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge.” In these words we are to take notice of three things: first, the love of Christ; second, its exceeding greatness; third, the knowledge of it.

First, then, we will begin with the first of these, namely, the love of Christ. To explain this, we must inquire into three things. First, who Christ is. Second, what love is. Third, what the love of Christ is.

First, Christ is a person of no lower rank than the one we spoke of before: he is very God. I say he is God, not in title only, not in name only, not as a counterfeit, but the very same in nature with the Father (John 1:1-2; 1 John 5:7; Phil 2:6). So what we have before us deserves all the more attention: that a person so great, so high, so glorious as this Jesus Christ was, should have a love for us that passes knowledge. It is common for equals to love one another, and for superiors to be loved. But for the King of princes, for the Son of God, for Jesus Christ to love man like this is amazing. And it is all the more amazing because man, the object of this love, is so low, so mean, so vile, so undeserving and so insignificant, as the Scriptures everywhere describe him.

But let me speak a little more particularly about this person. He is called God (John 1:1). The King of glory (Ps 24:10) and Lord of glory (1 Cor 2:8). The brightness of the glory of his Father (Heb 1:3). The head over all things (Eph 1:22). The Prince of life (Acts 3:15). The Creator of all things (Col 1:16). The upholder of all things (Heb 1:3). The disposer of all things (Matt 28:18). The only beloved of the Father (Matt 11).

But those whom he loves are called transgressors, sinners, enemies, dust and ashes, fleas (1 Sam 24:14), worms, shadows, vapors; vile, sinful, filthy, unclean, ungodly fools and madmen. Now, is this not something to wonder at? Should we not be moved by it, and say, “And will you set your eye upon such a one?” But how much more when he will set his heart upon us! And yet this great, this high, this glorious person truly, truly loves such as these.

Second, we now come to the second thing, namely, to show what love is. I will not do this by fine distinctions of words, but in plain and familiar talk, and yet with respect to the love of the person we are considering.

Love ought to be considered with reference to its subject as well as to its object.

The subject of love in the text is Christ. But since love in him is different from the love that is in us, it will not be amiss to show a little of the difference.

Love in us is a passion of the soul, and being such, it is subject to ebb and flow, and to run to extremes both ways. For whatever is a passion of the soul, whether love or hatred, joy or fear, is more apt to go too far or to fall short than to keep within its proper bounds. That is why what is loved today is often hated tomorrow (2 Sam 13:15). Yes, and what should be loved within the bounds of moderation is loved to the point of drowning both soul and body in perdition and destruction (1 Tim 6:9-10).

Besides this, love in us is apt to choose improper and unlawful objects for itself, and to reject those that we may embrace and enjoy with God’s permission. This passion of love in us is often so unruly with respect to the laws and rules of God’s government.

Love in us requires that there be something pleasing and delightful in the object loved, or at least that it appear so to the desire and fancy of the person loving. Otherwise love cannot act, for the love that is in us has no power to set itself to work where there is nothing attractive in the thing to be loved.

Love in us decays, however warm and firmly fixed it once was, if the object loses what first attracted and stirred it, or if it disappoints our expectation by something unexpectedly contrary to our fancy or our mind.

We know all this to be true from nature, for every one of us is like this. In matters of love we cannot refuse or choose except on the basis of these workings of our passions, and in proportion to them. So our love, as we are by nature, is weak and disorderly. It fails and miscarries, either by being too much or too little, even when the thing loved is a lawful object of love by both the law of nature and the law of grace. We must therefore put a vast difference between love as it is found in us and love as it is found in Christ, and that with respect to the nature, the principle, and the object of love.

Love in Christ is not love of the same nature as love in us. Love in him is essential to his being (1 John 4:16), but in us it is not so, as has already been shown. God is love; Christ is God; therefore Christ is love, love by nature. Love, then, is essential to his being. He could as soon cease to be as cease to love. It follows, then, that love in Christ does not flow from so low and beggarly a principle as love in man does. And consequently it is not, and cannot be, accompanied by the weaknesses or defects that accompany the love of man.

It is not accompanied by those unruly or uncertain motions that accompany ours. Here there is no ebbing, no flowing, no going too far, no falling short, and so nothing uncertain. “Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end” (John 13:1).

It is true that there is a way in which this love is shown that is suited to our capacities as men, and in that way we see it sometimes more and sometimes less (Song 7:11-12). It is also shown to us according to whether we do or do not walk with God in this world (John 14:23). I am speaking now of saints.

Love in Christ does not fix itself on improper or unlawful objects, nor does it refuse to embrace what the eternal covenant has made fit to receive it. It always acts according to God, and there is never at any time the least shadow of swerving from this.

Love in Christ requires no captivating beauty in the object to be loved, as though it could not put itself forth without such attractions (Ezek 16:6-8). It can act of and from itself, without depending on anything of that kind. This is plain to everyone who has the least true knowledge of what that object is in itself on which the Lord Jesus has set his heart to love.

Love in Christ does not decay, nor can it be tempted to decay by anything that happens, or shall happen hereafter, in the object of his love. Rather, as this love at first acts by and from itself, so it continues to act until all imperfections are completely and everlastingly subdued. The reason is that Christ loves us in order to make us lovely, not because we are so (Ezek 16:9-14).

Objection. But all along Christ compares his love to ours. Now why does he do that, if they are so unlike?

Answer. Because we do not know love except by the passions of love that work in our hearts. So he stoops to our capacities, and speaks of his love to us according to the way we find love working in ourselves toward others. That is why he sets forth his love to us by borrowing examples from our love to wife and children (Eph 5:25). Yes, sometimes he sets forth his love to us by calling to our minds how a man sometimes loves a woman who is a whore. “Go,” says God to the prophet, “love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine” (Hos 3:1).

But these things must not be understood with respect to the nature of love, but to its dispensations and manifestations. And not even with reference to these any further than this: he makes use of such fitting comparisons to commend his love to us, and so to awaken in us affection toward him for the love he has bestowed on us.

Christ’s love, therefore, must be considered both with respect to its essence and with respect to its various workings. As to its essence, it is, as I said, natural to him, and as such it is the root and ground of all those actions of his by which he has shown that he is loving to sinful man. But now, although the love that is in him is essential to his nature and can vary no more than God himself can, yet we do not see this love except by its fruits, nor can it be discerned any other way. “Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us” (1 John 3:16).

We must turn, then, to the discoveries of this love. These are of two sorts: those that are the foundations, and those that are the consequences of those foundational acts. The ones I call the foundations are those on which all the other discoveries of his goodness depend, and they are two: 1. His dying for us. 2. His making use of his death for us at the right hand of God.

Third, this leads me to the third particular, namely, to show you what the love of Christ is, that is, in the discovery of it. “And to know the love of Christ” (Eph 3:19).

The love of Christ is made known to us, as I said, first, by his dying for us, and second, by his making use of his dying for us.

1. His dying for us appears (1) to be wonderful in itself, and (2) in his preparations for that work.

(1) It appears to be wonderful in itself, and that both with respect to the nature of that death and with respect to the persons for whom he died.

The love of Christ appears to be wonderful by the death he died: in that he died, and in that he died such a death. It was strange love in Christ that moved him to die for us. It was strange because it was not according to the custom of the world. Men do not usually, in cold blood, deliberately climb the scaffold or the gallows ladder to lay down their lives for others. But Jesus Christ did this, and he did it for people whose character, if it is rightly considered, will make this act of his far more amazing. He laid down his life for his enemies (Rom 5), and for those who could not stand him. Yes, he laid it down for those, even for those, who brought him to the cross. He did this not accidentally, or because it happened that way, but knowingly and by design (Zech 12:10). He knew it was for them that he was dying, and yet his love led him to lay down his life for them.

I will add this: those very people for whom he laid down his life did all they could, by every kind of behavior, to provoke him to pray to God his Father to send and cut them off with the flaming sword of angels (Matt 26:53). Yet he would not be provoked, but would lay down his life for them. Nor must I stop here. We never read that Jesus Christ was more cheerful in all his life on earth than when he was going to lay down his life for them. Then he gave thanks to God (Luke 22:19); then he sang (Matt 26:30).

But this is not all. He did not only die, but died such a death as truly cannot be expressed. He was content to be counted the sinner; yes, to be counted the sin of the sinner. This could not but be hateful to so holy a Lamb as he was, and yet he was willing to be this, and thus, for the love he bore to men.

This being so, it follows that his sufferings must be beyond conceiving. For he had to undergo what in justice was the proper wages of sin and sinners, and no one can know what that was so well as he himself and the damned spirits. For the proper wages of sin, and of sinners for their sin, is that death which lays pains, such pains as sin deserves, on the man who dies that way. But Christ died that way, and consequently he was seized by those pains, not only in body but in soul. His tears, his cries, his bloody sweat (Luke 22:44), the hiding of his Father’s face, yes, God’s forsaking of him in his extremity (Matt 27:46), declare plainly enough the nature of the death he died (Mark 15:39).

For my part, I stand amazed at those who would not have the world believe that the death of Jesus Christ was, in itself, as terrible as it was.

I will not stop here to discuss the place called hell, where the spirits of the damned are; we are discussing the nature of Christ’s sufferings. And I say this: if Christ was put into the very position of one who must suffer what in justice ought to be inflicted for sin, then I do not know how we can make so little of the greatness of his sufferings, as some do, without undervaluing the greatness of his love. And how they will answer for it, I do not know.

On the other hand, what if I should say that the soul of Christ suffered as long as his body lay in the grave? And what if I should say that God’s loosing of the pains of death at Christ’s resurrection (Acts 2:24) should be spoken of not so much with reference to his body as to his soul, if to his body at all? For what pain of death was his body capable of when his soul was separated from it? And yet God’s loosing of the pains of death seems to come immediately before his rising from the dead. And Peter does indeed seem to follow this sense when he says, “For David speaketh concerning him; I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for he is on my right hand, that I should not be moved. Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also my flesh shall rest in hope, because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one to see corruption” (Acts 2:25-27). This, says Peter, was not spoken of David. Rather, David, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath that of the fruit of his loins according to the flesh he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne (Acts 2:29-30), saw this beforehand and spoke of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither did his flesh see corruption (Acts 2:31).

“Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell”; his soul was not left in hell. What use are these expressions if the soul of Christ did not suffer, if it did not suffer when it was separated from the body? For it is that time that the apostle Peter seems to be speaking about. Besides, if it is not improper to say that a soul was not left in a place where it never was, then I am at a loss. “Thou wilt not leave”; his soul was not left there; therefore it was there. That seems to be the natural conclusion. If it is objected that by hell is meant the grave, it is foolish to think that the soul of Christ lay there while his body lay dead in it. Again, the apostle seems clearly to distinguish between the places where Christ’s soul and body were, counting his body to be in the grave and his soul, for that time, in hell.

If someone objects with what he said to the thief on the cross (Luke 23:43), I can answer that Christ might have spoken that with reference to his Godhead. If so, it is no objection to what I have suggested. And why may it not be understood that way, just as when he said, while on earth, “The Son of man which is in heaven” (John 3:13), meaning himself? For the personhood of the Son of God, whether you call him Son of man or by whatever other fitting term, resides not in the human nature but in the divine nature of Jesus Christ.

However, since hell is sometimes taken for the place (Acts 1:25), sometimes for the grave, sometimes for the state (Ps 116:3), and sometimes only for a figure of the place where the damned are tormented (Jonah 2:2), I will not strictly assign to Christ the place, the prison where the damned spirits are (1 Pet 3:19). But I will say, as I said before, that he was put into the place of sinners, into the sins of sinners, and received what by justice was the proper wages of sin, both in body and soul, as is evident from Isa 53:10-11. This soul of his I take to be what the inward parts and the fat of the burnt sacrifices were a figure or shadow of. And the fat and the inwards were burnt upon the altar, whilst the body was burned for sin without the camp (Exod 29:13-14; Lev 8:14-17).

And now, having said this much, in what way have I taken anything away from the glory and holiness of Christ? On the contrary, I have tried to set forth something of the greatness of his sorrows, the hatefulness of sin, the nature of justice, and the love of Christ. And be sure of this: the more the sufferings of the Son of God abounded for us, the more this unsearchable love of Christ was made manifest. Nor can those who would pare away these infinite sufferings of our Lord before the people, and make little of them, make his love as great as they ought, let them use whatever rhetoric they can.

As for their objection to the hateful names and place of hell, judging it unfit to say that so holy a person as the Son of God was there, I answer: although I have not asserted it, let me ask, which is more hateful, hell or sin? Or do such people think that Christ Jesus would have been liable to be tainted by the badness of the place, had he been there? Or when the Scripture says that God is in hell, is that any disparagement to him (Ps 139:8)? Or if a man should be so bold as to say so, does he by saying it confine Christ to that place forever? And by thinking so, has he contradicted what is called the Apostles’ Creed?

(2) Having spoken in this way of the death and sufferings of Christ, I will next speak of his preparations for so suffering for us, and by doing so show you something more of the greatness of his love.

Christ, as I have told you, was even before his sufferings a person of no lowly birth, for he was the Son of the eternal God. Nor did his Father have any other such son but him. Consequently he was by right the heir of all things, and so was to have dominion over all worlds. For “for him were all things created” (Col 1:16). And hence all creatures are subject to him; yes, the angels of God worship him (Heb 1). Considered in this light, then, he did not add anything to his standing by becoming lower than the angels for us; for what can be added to one who is God by nature? Indeed, for our sakes he took human nature into union with himself, and so began to show his glory; and the kindness he had for us before all worlds now began to show itself in a remarkable way. If this Christ of God, our friend, had given all he had to save us, would not his love have been wonderful? But when he gives himself for us, this is more wonderful still. But this is not all. Things stood so between God and man that this Son of God could not, as he was before the world was made, give himself as a ransom for us. He was altogether incapable of doing it, for he was one who could not be subject to death, the condition that we had put ourselves into by sin.

Therefore what would have been a death to some, that is, laying aside glory and becoming, instead of the King of princes, a servant of the lowest kind, this he was heartily content to do of his own good will. And so he who was once the object of the angels’ fear has now become a little creature, a worm, an inferior one (Ps 22:6). He was born of a woman, brought forth in a stable, laid in a manger (Luke 2:7), scorned by men, tempted by devils (Luke 4:2). He depended on his creatures for food, for clothing, for shelter, and for a place to lay his head when he was dead. In a word, he “made himself of no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men” (Phil 2:7), so that he might become able to do us this kindness. And it is worth your noticing that all the while he was in the world, going through those other preparations that had to come before he was made a sacrifice for us, no one, so far as we read, ever once had a heart to thank him for what he came to do, though he told many what he had come about (Isa 53:3).

No, they railed on him, they degraded him, they called him a devil, they said he was mad, a deceiver, a blasphemer of God and a rebel against the state. They accused him before the governor. Yes, one of his disciples sold him, another denied him, and they all forsook him and left him to fend for himself in the hands of his horrible enemies. These beat him with their fists, spat on him, mocked him, crowned him with thorns, scourged him, made a public spectacle of him, and finally hung him up alive by the hands and the feet, and gave him vinegar to increase his affliction when he complained that his anguish had made him thirsty. And yet all this could not take his heart off the work of our redemption. To die he came, die he would, and die he did, before he returned to the Father, for our sins, so that we might live through him.

Nor should what we read in the Word about the temporal sufferings he underwent be overlooked and passed by without serious consideration, since they were part of the curse that our sin had deserved. For all temporal plagues are due to our sin while we live, as well as the curse of God to everlasting perdition when we die. This, then, is the reason why the whole life of the Lord Jesus was such a life of affliction and sorrow: in it he bore our sicknesses and took upon himself what we deserved. So now the curse in temporal things, as well as the curse in spiritual things and of everlasting condemnation, has been removed by him from God’s people. And that he overcame these sufferings and made his way to the cross was owing to the worth of the humble obedience he gave to his Father’s law in our flesh. For his whole life, as well as his death, was a life of merit, purchase, and desert. Hence it is said, “he increased in favour with God” (Luke 2:52). For his works made him still more acceptable to God. Since he stood in the place of man and became our reconciler to God, the heavenly Majesty counted him as such; and so he obtained for us what he earned by his work as Mediator, and he also shared in it himself as our head.

And was there not love in all these things, and love that was infinite? Any love that was not of the very essence of his divine nature could never have carried him through so great a work as this. Mere passions would have failed here; they would have retreated and recoiled. Yes, his very humanity would have flagged and fainted here, had it not been managed, governed and strengthened by his eternal Spirit. That is why it is said that “through the eternal Spirit he offered himself without spot to God” (Heb 9:14). And it is said that he was declared to be the Son of God by so doing and by the resurrection from the dead (Rom 1:4).

2. We come now to the second thing proposed, by which his love is discovered, and that is the use he has made of his dying for us. But I must beg my reader’s pardon if they think that I can discover the ten hundred thousandth part of it, for that is impossible. My meaning is only to give a few hints of the beginnings of the use he has made of it, as a step toward his further progress in it.

(1) This death of his for us, then, had such power that in the space of three days and three nights it reconciled to God, in the body of his flesh, all and every one of God’s elect, he acting as their representative. When Christ set himself to die, he presented himself to the justice of the law as a representative, standing in the stead, place and room of all those he undertook for. He gave “his life a ransom for many” (Matt 20:28). “He came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim 1:15). And as he presented himself in this way, so God his Father admitted him to this work. Therefore it is said, “The Lord laid upon him the iniquity of us all”; and again, “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows” (Isa 53:4, 6, 12). Hence it follows unavoidably that whatever he felt and underwent in the manner, nature or horribleness of the death he died, he felt and underwent it all as a representative; that is, as one standing in the place of others. Therefore it is said, “He was wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities,” and that “the chastisement of our peace was upon him” (Isa 53:5). And again, “the just died for the unjust” (1 Pet 3:18).

Now then, suppose he presented himself to justice as a representative; suppose God so admitted and accounted him; suppose God also laid on him the sins of the people whose persons he represented, and on that basis punished him with the punishments and the death he died. Then the Father has concluded that Christ, in life and in death, lived and died as a common or public person, representing in this life and death all those for whom he undertook thus to live and thus to die. So then, it must necessarily be that whatever next befalls this representative befalls him with respect to those in whose room and place he stood and suffered. Now, what follows next is that he is justified by God: that is, acquitted and discharged from this punishment for the sake of the worth of his death and merits. For that had to come before he could be raised from the dead (Acts 2:24). God did not raise him up as guilty in order to justify him afterward; his resurrection was the declaration of his justification, which had already taken place. He was raised from the dead because it was not possible, in either equity or justice, that he should be held there any longer; his merits procured the contrary.

Now, he was condemned by God’s law and died by the hand of justice; he was acquitted by God’s law and justified by justice; and all this as a representative. So then, in his acquittal we are acquitted, and in his justification we are justified. And therefore the apostle applies God’s justifying of Christ to himself, and does so rightly (Isa 50:8; Rom 8:33-34). For if Christ is my surety, and will stand in my place and act for me, it is only reasonable that I should share in it. Therefore we are also said to be “quickened together with him” (Eph 2:5), that is, when he was quickened in the grave, and to be raised up together and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Therefore another scripture says, “Hath he quickened you … together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses” (Col 2:13). This quickening must not be understood of the renewing of our hearts, but of the restoring of Jesus Christ to life after he was crucified. We are said to be quickened together with him because we were quickened in him at his death, and were to fall or stand by him all the way through the work of the three days and three nights, and were therefore to share our lot with him. That is why it is said again that his resurrection is our justification (Rom 4:25); that by one offering he has purged our sins forever (Heb 10:12); and that by his death he has “delivered us from the wrath to come” (1 Thess 1:10).

But, I say, I want to be understood rightly. This life still resides in the Son, and is communicated from him to us as we are called to believe his word. Meanwhile we are secured from wrath and hell, being justified in his justification, quickened in his quickening, raised up in his resurrection, and made to sit already together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus!

And is not this a glorious use he has made of his death: that after two days the whole body of the elect should be revived in him, and that on the third day we should live in the sight of God, in him and by him (Hos 6:2; Heb 6:18-20)?

(2) Another use he has made of his death for us was this: by it he slew our infernal foes for us. By it he abolished death (2 Tim 1:10). By death he destroyed him that had the power of death (Heb 2:14). By death he took away the sting of death (1 Cor 15:55-56). By death he made death a pleasant sleep to the saints, and the grave, for a while, an easy house and home for the body. By death he made death such an advantage to us that it has become a means of carrying the souls of those who believe in him over into life. And all this is plain, because death is ours, a blessing to us, as well as Paul and Apollos, the world and life itself (1 Cor 3:22). And that all this is done for us by his death is evident because his person is where it is, and because by himself, as our representative, he has won the victory for us. For though all things are not yet put under our feet, yet we see Jesus crowned with honor and glory, who by the grace of God tasted death for every man. “For it became God, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings” (Heb 2:7-10).

It became him: that is, it was only just and right that he should do so, if there was enough in the worth and power of his death and blood to require such a thing. And there was. Therefore God has exalted him, and us in him, above these infernal foes. Let us therefore see ourselves delivered from death first by the exaltation of our Jesus. Let us behold him, I say, as crowned with glory and honor as, or because, he tasted death for us. And then we shall see ourselves already in heaven by our head, our surety, our Jesus, our Savior.

(3) Another use that has already been made of his death for us is this. At his entrance into the presence of God, for his worthiness’ sake, he has obtained that the Holy Spirit should be given to him for us. This was so that by the Spirit we might, in all things yet to be done, be made fit to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, personally, in ourselves, as well as representatively, by our head and forerunner. Therefore the abundant pouring out of the Spirit was held back until the resurrection and glorification of our Lord Jesus. “For the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified” (John 7:39). Nor was the Spirit given out as soon as he received it. He received it on his entering into the holy place, when he had sprinkled the mercy seat with the blood of sprinkling; but it was not given out to us until some time after (Acts 4), though it was obtained before (Acts 2:32-33).

And it was fitting that, in that infinite immeasurableness in which he received it, the Spirit should first rest upon him. This was so that his human nature, which was the firstfruits of God’s election, might receive by the Spirit’s resting on him the glory for which it was ordained; and so that we might receive sanctification in its fullness, as we receive all other things, first by our head and surety. Hence it is written that as he is made of God unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and redemption, so he is made sanctification too (1 Cor 1:30). For first we are sanctified in his flesh, as we are justified by his righteousness. Therefore he is that Holy One who sets us, in himself, as a holy lump before God, not only with reference to justification and life, but with reference to sanctification and holiness. For we who are elect are all considered in him as he has received the Spirit, as well as in his having taken possession of heaven for us.

I do not count this the whole of the benefit that comes to us by Jesus’ receiving the Holy Spirit at his entrance into the presence of God for us. For we are also to receive the Spirit ourselves from him, as God places us in the body at the times appointed by the Father, so that, as was said, we may receive personal quickening, personal renewal, personal sanctification, and in conclusion, glory. But I say, as for his having received this Holy Spirit to himself, he received it as the effect of his ascension, which was the effect of his resurrection and of the merit of his death and passion. And he received it as a representative, as a head and surety for the people.

(4) Another use that has been made of his death and its merits for us is this: he has obtained from God to be made the chief and high Lord of heaven and earth for us. (All this while we are speaking of the exaltation of the human nature, in, by and with which the Son of God became able to be our reconciler to God.) “All things,” he says, “are delivered unto me of my Father” (Matt 11:27). “And all power in heaven and earth is given unto me” (Matt 28:18). And all this because he died. “He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross; wherefore God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, of things in earth, or things under the earth: and that every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2). And all this, as was said before, is for our sakes. God has given him to be head over all things to the church (Eph 1:22).

Therefore whoever is set up on earth is set up by our Lord. “By me,” he says, “kings reign, and princes decree justice. By me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the earth” (Prov 8:15-16). Nor, once they are set up, are they left to do their own will and pleasure, even if they should want to. The bridle (2 Sam 8:1) is in his own hand, and he gives them rein or reins them in, just as it pleases him. He has this power for the well-being of his people. Nor are the fallen angels exempt from being put under his rebuke. He is the “only potentate” (1 Tim 6:15), and in his own times he will show it. Peter tells us that he “is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels, and authorities, and powers being made subject unto him” (1 Pet 3:22).

This power, as I said, he has received for the sake of his church on earth, for her guidance and well-being among the sons of men. Hence, as he is called the King of nations in general (Jer 10:7), so he is called the King of saints in particular (Rev 15:3). And as he is said to be head over all things in general, so he is head to his church in particular.

(5) Another use he has made of his death for us is this: he has obtained, and received into his own hand, enough gifts to make ministers for his church. I say, to make and maintain a sufficient ministry, in the face of all that would hinder it (1 Cor 12:28-30). Therefore he says, “When he ascended on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. And he gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for edifying of the body of Christ. Until we all come in the unity of the faith, and knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ” (Eph 4:8-14).

Satan has devised many ways to bring into contempt this blessed advantage that Christ has received from God for the benefit of his church. He does it partly by stirring up people to revile the sufficiency of the Holy Spirit in this matter. He does it partly by stirring up his own limbs and members to spread his delusions in the world in the name of Christ, and, as they blasphemously call it, with the help of the Holy Spirit. And he does it partly by tempting novices in the faith to study and labor over hair-splitting distinctions, and to affect strange expressions that depart from the form of sound words, all to win applause and a name for themselves, which is a forerunner of their own destruction (1 Tim 3:6).

But notwithstanding all this, “Wisdom is justified of her children” (Matt 11:19). And at the last day, when the outside and inside of all things shall be seen and compared, it will appear that the Son of God has so managed his own servants in the ministry of his word, and so managed his word while they have been laboring in it, as to put his blessing by that upon the souls of sinners (Jas 1:18); and that he has blown away all other things like chaff.

(6) Another use the Lord Christ has made of his death for his people is obtaining heaven for them and taking possession of it. “By his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us” (Heb 9:12). This heaven! Who knows what it is (Matt 22:23)? This glory! Who knows what it is? It is called God’s throne, God’s house (John 14:2), God’s habitation, paradise (2 Cor 12:4), the kingdom of God, the high and holy place (Isa 57:15), Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16:22), and the place of heavenly pleasures (Ps 16:11). In this heaven is to be found the face of God forever (Ps 41:12); immortality, the person of Christ, the prophets, the angels, the revelation of all mysteries, the knowledge of all the elect, eternity.

Of this heaven, as was said before, we are already in possession. We are in it, we are seated in it, and we already share in its benefits, but all by our head and surety. And it is fitting that we should believe this, rejoice in this, talk of this, tell one another of this, and live in the expectation of our own personal enjoyment of it. And as we should do all this, so we should bless and praise the name of God, who has handed over this house, this kingdom and inheritance into the hand of so faithful a friend; yes, a brother, a Savior and a blessed surety for us. And lastly, since all the things already mentioned are the fruit of the sufferings of our Jesus, and his sufferings the fruit of that love of his that passeth knowledge, how we should bow the knee before him and call him tender Father! Yes, how we should love and obey him, devote ourselves to his service, and be willing to be sufferers for his sake as well; to whom be honor and glory forever. And this is as much as I will say of the love of Christ in general.

I might add many other things here. But as I told you before, under the head we have just touched on, we would deal with the fundamentals, the great and chief parts, of Christ’s love, and then, second, more particularly with its exceeding greatness. So we must now say something about that.

And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge (Eph 3:19). Since it is said to pass knowledge, it is plain that it is exceedingly great, or that it goes far beyond what can be known. For to exceed is to go beyond, to be above, or to be out of the reach of whatever would try to take in the thing that exceeds it. And since the expression is completely open-ended, and does not concern the knowledge of this or that creature only, it is plain that Paul, by speaking this way, challenges all creatures in heaven and earth to find the bottom of this love if they can. The love of Christ, which passeth knowledge. I will add that, since he is open-ended about the knowledge as well as about the persons knowing, there is no doubt that he here takes on all knowledge, whatever enlargements, attainments, improvements and heights it has, or may ever attain to. It passeth knowledge.

Of the same import is that other passage of the apostle a little earlier in the very same chapter. “I preach,” he says, “among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ” (Eph 3:8): that is, those riches of Christ that, in their all, cannot be found out by searching. The riches: the riches of his love and grace. The riches of his love and grace toward us. “For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be made rich” (2 Cor 8:9). “Ye know the grace”: that is, you know it so far, and so far every believer does know it. For it is plain to everyone that he left heaven and took flesh on himself so that he might bring us there. But all the grace that was wrapped up in that amazing condescension, no one knows, and no one can know. For if that could be, the very possibility would flatly contradict the text: “The love of Christ which passeth knowledge.” Therefore the riches of this love, in their utmost, are not known and cannot be known by anyone, however much their understanding and knowledge may be heightened and improved. Yes, and once they are heightened and improved, let them make whatever search they can into this love and grace. “That which is afar off, and exceeding deep, who can find out?” (Eccl 7:24). That this love of Christ is so will soon be made plainer. But for now we will go on to particular challenges to prove this, and then we will press the reasons that will further confirm the whole.

1. This love passes the knowledge of the wisest saint. Here we single out the one who has made the most progress in this knowledge. To confirm this, I need go no further than the man who spoke these words, that is, Paul, for in his conclusion he includes himself. The love of Christ, which passeth knowledge: even my knowledge. It is as if he said, “Though I have waded a long way into the grace of Christ, and have as much experience of his love as any man in all the world, yet I confess that I fall short of the fullness that is in it. Nor will I hesitate to conclude of anyone else that ‘he knows nothing yet as he ought to know’” (1 Cor 8:2; 1 Cor 13:12).

2. This love passes the knowledge of all the saints, even if all their knowledge were put together. If we, all of us and every one, each contributed the whole of what we know toward showing what this love is, it would add up to no more than a broken knowledge. We know only in part, we see darkly (1 Cor 13:9-12); we walk not by sight but by faith (2 Cor 5:7). True, so far we are speaking of saints on earth.

3. But we will speak of saints in heaven. They cannot know this love of Christ to the utmost. It is true that they know more of it than saints on earth, because they are more in the open sight of it, and are also more enlarged, being spirits made perfect, than we on earth are. Yet, to say no more for now, they do not see the rich and unsearchable outflowings of this love to sinners here on earth. Nor can they, there, measure what it is to others by what they themselves knew of it here. For sins, times, persons and other circumstances may greatly alter the case. But if all the saints on earth and all the saints in heaven were to contribute everything they know of this love of Christ, and put it into one sum of knowledge, they would still fall far short of knowing the utmost of this love, for there is an infinite amount of this love still unknown to them. It is said plainly that those on earth do not yet know what they shall be (1 John 3:2). And as for those in heaven, they are not yet made perfect as they shall be (Heb 11:39-40). Besides, we find that the souls under the altar, however perfect they now are compared with the state they were in when they were in the body, are still not able in every point, though they are in glory, to know (Isa 63:16), and so to govern themselves there, without directions (Rev 6:9-11). I say, they are not able, without directions and instructions, to know the kinds and ways in which the love of Christ works toward us who live on earth.

4. We will join the angels to these. And when all of them, together with men, have put together every bit of what they know of this love of Christ, they must still fall far short of reaching, or understanding, its utmost bound. I grant that angels do know, in certain parts of the knowledge of the love of Christ, more than saints on earth can know while they are here. But then again, I know that even the angels learn many things from saints on earth, which shows that they themselves also know only in part (Eph 3:10). So then, all of them, as yet, as to this love of Christ and the utmost knowledge of it, are only so many imperfect knowers (1 Pet 1:12). Nor can they all, putting all their imperfect knowledge together, make up a perfect knowledge of this love of Christ. For the texts still stand where they did, and say that his riches are unsearchable, and his love is that which passeth knowledge.

We will now show you, besides what has already been touched on, the reason why these riches are unsearchable, and why that love is such as passes knowledge.

Reason 1. The first reason is because it is eternal. Everything that is eternal carries with it a fourfold impossibility, as to the utmost knowledge of it: (1) it is without beginning; (2) it is without end; (3) it is infinite; (4) it is incomprehensible.

(1) It is without beginning. Whatever existed before the world existed is without a beginning, and the love of Christ was before the world.

This is evident from the eighth chapter of Proverbs. His delights, before God had made the world, are there said to be “with the sons of men.” Not that we had any existence then, for we were not yet created. But though we had not yet been created, we had a being in the love and affections of Jesus Christ. Now this love of Christ, as to its fullness and as to its utmost, must of necessity be entirely unknown to man. Who can tell how many heart-pleasing thoughts Christ had of us before the world began? Who can tell how much he then delighted in the being we had in his affections, and also in thinking of our coming into being, our believing, and our being with him afterward?

In general we may conclude that it was great. For there seems to be a parallel between his Father’s delight in him and his delight in us: “I was daily his delight, … and my delights were with the sons of men” (Prov 8:22, 30-31). But I say, who can tell, who can tell completely, what and how much the Father delighted in his Son before the world began? Who can tell what kind of delight the Father had in the Son before the world began? Why, there seems to be a parallel between the Father’s love for Christ and Christ’s love for us, between the Father’s delight in Christ and his delight in us. Yes, Christ confirms it, saying, “As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you, continue ye in my love” (John 15:9).

I know that I have not yet come to the nature of the word eternal. Yet since by eternal we mean before the world began, as well as forward to an endless forever, we may ask our readers a little whether they can tell the kind or measure of the love with which Christ loved us then. I remember the question God asked Job: “Where,” he says, “wast thou when I laid the foundation of the earth? declare if thou hast understanding” (Job 38:4). By this he implied that because it was done before Job had his being, Job could not tell how it was done. Now, if a work as visible as the creation is still wholly unknown, as to the manner of its workmanship, to those who came into being afterward, how shall something that has been more hidden and inward in all its circumstances be found out by those who have word of it only by the ear, and only in part, and that in a mystery, and long afterward? But to conclude this point: what is eternal is without any beginning. This was set out for consideration earlier, and therefore it cannot be known perfectly.

(2) What is eternal is without end, and how can an endless thing be known? What has no end has no middle. So it is impossible that his church should ever come to know even half of the love that Christ has for it.

I know that the sights the saved will have of this love in heaven will far surpass our utmost knowledge here, as far as the light of the sun at noon goes beyond the light of a flickering candle at midnight. And that is why, when the days of those sights have come, the knowledge we have now will be swallowed up. “When that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away” (1 Cor 13:10). And although he speaks here of perfection, “when that which is perfect is come…,” even that perfection must not be thought of as the perfection of God. For then all who are saved would be so many eternals and so many infinites, as he is infinite. But the meaning is this: we shall then be with the Eternal One, and shall enjoy him directly, with all the perfection of knowledge that is possible for a creature, when he is raised to the utmost height that his created substance can bear. But for all that, this perfection will still fall short of the perfection of the one who made him, and so it will fall short of knowing the utmost of his love, since that love, at its root, is his very essence and nature.

I know it also says that we shall know even as we are known. But this must not be understood as if we should know God as fully as he knows us. It would be folly and madness to conclude that. The meaning is that we are known for happiness; we are known by God for heaven and blessedness. And when that which is perfect has come, then we shall perfectly know and enjoy that for which God now knows us. And this is what the apostle longed for, namely, if by any means he might lay hold of that for which he was also laid hold of by Christ Jesus (Phil 3:12); that is, to know and see what God had appointed him to, and what Christ Jesus had laid hold of him for.

It is said again, “We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). This text concerns the Son as to his humanity, not as to his divinity; not, that is, as to his divinity considered simply or distinctly. For as to that, a spirit could as soon drink up the sea as the most enlarged saint who is, or ever will be, in glory could see God so as to know him completely, to the utmost, or through and through. But the humanity of the Son of God we shall see through and through, in all the beauty and glory that is on him, the glory that was prepared for him before the foundation of the world. And Christ wills that we shall see this glory when he takes us up in glory to himself (John 17:24). But the utmost boundlessness of the divine majesty, the eternal deity of the Son of God, cannot be known to the utmost or completely. I do not doubt that then, in him (I mean in Christ) and in us, there will break forth such glorious rays and beams of the eternal majesty as will make him admirable in each of us to one another (2 Thess 1:10). Nor do I doubt that then we shall know things of God that never entered our hearts to think of now. But the whole is not, cannot be, and never shall be fully known by anyone.

And therefore the love of Christ, being essential to himself, cannot be known, because of the endlessness that is in it. As I said before, what has no end has no middle. How then shall those who will be in heaven eternally ever cross half the breadth of eternity? True, I know that all enjoyments there will be eternal enjoyments. Yes, whatever we shall embrace there, or whatever embraces we shall be embraced with, will be eternal. But I make a distinction between what is eternal as to its nature and what is eternal as to its lasting. The nature of eternal things we shall enjoy as soon as ever we come to heaven. But the duration of eternal things we shall never be able to pass through, for they are endless. So then, the eternal love of Christ, as to its nature, will be perfectly known by the saints when they live in heaven, but they will never reach its endlessness. And this will be their happiness. For if we could ever reach the end of our blessedness in heaven (as we would, if we could reach the end of this love of Christ), why then, as the saying goes, we would be at the land’s end, and feel the bottom of all our enjoyments. Besides, whatever has an end has a time to decay and to cease to be, as well as a time to show its highest excellencies. So from all these considerations it is most plain that the love of Christ is unsearchable, and that it passes knowledge.

(3) and (4) Now the other two things follow as a matter of course, namely, that this love is infinite and incomprehensible. So here is something that still stands above and beyond even those who have arrived at the utmost of their perfection. And this, if I may put it so, will keep them occupied even when they are in heaven. It will not be an occupation that is laborious, tiresome or burdensome, but one that is dutiful, delightful and profitable. For although the work and worship of the saints in heaven is not yet particularly revealed, and so “it doth not yet appear what we shall be” (1 John 3:2), yet in general we may say that there will be something there for them to do that they have not yet done, and by the work they do there, their delight will be a delight to them. The law was the shadow, and not the very image, of heavenly things (Heb 10:1). The image is an image, and not the heavenly things themselves (Heb 9:23), and the heavenly things are the saints: there shall be worship in the heavens. Nor will this take anything at all from their glory. The angels now wait on God and serve him (Ps 103:20). The Son of God is now a minister, and attends to his service in heaven (Heb 8:1-2). Some saints have been employed in service for God after they had been in heaven (Luke 9:29-32). And I see no reason to believe that we should be idle spectators when we come there.

Someone may say, “They there rest from their labours” (Rev 14:13). True, but not from their delights. Everything that was once burdensome, whether in suffering or in service, will then be done away, and what is delightful and pleasurable will remain. “But then,” you say, “it will be a time to receive, and not to work.” True, if by work you mean what we now count as work. But what if our work there is to receive and bless? The fish in the sea drink; they swim and drink. But as for further discussion of this, let it alone till we come there. And now to come down into the world again, for we have been talking of things on high.

Reason 2. This love of Christ must of necessity be beyond our knowledge, because we cannot possibly know the utmost of our sin. It is sin that sets out, and sets off, our knowledge of the love of Christ. Four things must be spoken to in order to make this clear: (1) the nature of sin; (2) the aggravations of sin; (3) the utmost tendencies of sin; and (4) the perfect knowledge of all this.

(1) Before we can know this love of Christ in the way described above, we must of necessity know the nature of sin: that is, what sin is, what sin is in itself. But no one knows the nature of sin to the full, not what sin in itself fully is. The apostle says that sin, that is, sin in itself, is “exceeding sinful” (Rom 7:13). That is, its filthiness exceeds and goes beyond our knowledge. But this is seen by the commandment. Now the reason no one can know the horrible nature of sin to the full is that no one can know the blessed nature of the blessed God to the full. For sin is the opposite of God. There is nothing that seeks, absolutely and by its own nature, to overcome God and to annihilate him, except sin, and sin does exactly that. Sin is worse than the devil. Therefore anyone who is more afraid of the devil than of sin does not know the badness of sin as he ought, and knows only a little of the love of Jesus Christ. If someone does not know what sin would have done to the world, had Christ not stepped in between those harms and the world, how can he know even the extent of the love of Christ in general? And anyone who does not know what sin would have done to him in particular, had Christ the Lord not stepped in and saved him, cannot know the utmost of the love of Christ to him in particular. Sin, therefore, in its utmost evil, cannot be known by us; and so, consequently, the love of Christ in its utmost goodness cannot be known by us.

Besides, there are many sins committed by us, dropping from us and polluting us, that we are not aware of at all. How then should we know the love of Christ by which we are delivered from them? Lord, “who can understand his errors?” said David (Ps 19:12). Consequently, who can understand the love that saves him from them? Moreover, whoever knows the love of Christ to the full must also know to the full the wrath and anger of God that burns like hell itself against sinners for the sake of sin. But no one knows this. Lord, “who knoweth the power of thine anger?” said Moses (Ps 90:11). Therefore no one knows this love of Christ to the full.

The nature of sin is to get into our good, to mix itself with our good, and many times to lie lurking under the form and show of good. It does this so closely, so cunningly and so invisibly that the person concerned embraces it as virtue and knows no other way to act. And yet he is saved from this by the love of Christ. And therefore, as I hinted just now, if a man does not know the nature of his wound, how should he know the nature and excellence of the balm that has cured him of his wound?

(2) There are the due aggravations that belong to sin, with which men are unacquainted. It was one of the great tasks God gave the prophets toward the people (Jer 2) not only to show them their sins but also to show them what aggravations belonged to those sins (Jer 3; Ezek 16). There are sins against light, sins against knowledge, sins against love, sins against learning, sins against threatenings, sins against promises, vows and resolutions, sins against experience, sins against examples of God’s anger, and sins that have great, high and strange aggravations attached to them. Of these we are ignorant, though not altogether, yet in far too great a measure. Now if these things are so, how can the love that saves us from them be known or understood to the full?

Alas, our ignorance of these things shows in our unwillingness to bear affliction, in our secret murmuring under the hand of God, in our wondering why we are chastised as we are, and in our feeling that the affliction is taking too long to be removed.

Or if our ignorance of the vileness of our actions does not show this way, it shows in our lightness under our guilt, in our slight thoughts of what we have done, and in our slovenly doing of our duties and asking for forgiveness after some evil or unbecoming action. It is no use going into particulars. The whole course of our lives makes it all too plain that we fall wonderfully short in knowing both the nature and the aggravations of our sins. How then should we know, in its full dimensions, the love of Christ by which we are saved and delivered from them?

(3) Who knows the utmost tendencies of sin? I mean, what the least sin drives at, and what it would unavoidably run the sinner into. There is not a plague, a judgment, an affliction, an evil under heaven, that the least of our transgressions has not called for at the hands of the great God! No, the least sin calls for all the distresses under heaven to fall on the soul and body of the sinner at once. This is plain, because the least sin deserves hell, which is worse than all the plagues on earth. But I say, who understands this? And I say again, if one sin, the least sin, deserves all these things, what do you think all your sins deserve? How many judgments! How many plagues! How many lashes with God’s iron whip do you deserve? Besides, there is hell itself, the place itself, the fire itself, the nature of the torments and how long they last. Who can understand that?

But this is not all. The tendency of your sins is to kill others. Men, even good men, little think how many of their neighbors one of their sins may kill. For example, how many good men and good women unknowingly, through their carelessness, drive their own children down into the deep (Ps 106:6-7)? We will readily count those very hard-hearted sinners who used to offer their children in sacrifice to devils, when it is easy for us to do worse ourselves. They only killed the body, but we may kill body and soul in hell, if we do not take care.

Do we know how our sins provoke God? How they grieve the Holy Spirit? How they weaken our graces? How they spoil our prayers? How they weaken faith? How they tempt Christ to be ashamed of us? And how they hold back good from us? And if we do not know every one of all these things to the full, how shall we know to the full the love of Christ that saves us from them all?

(4) Again, who has the perfect knowledge of all these things? I will grant that some good souls may have waded a long way into one or more of them. But I know that there is no one who thoroughly knows them all. And yet the love of Christ saves us from all, notwithstanding all the vileness and soul-damning power that is in them. Alas, how short we are of knowledge of ourselves, and of what is in us! How many are there who do not know that man consists of a body made of dust and an immortal soul? Yes, and how many of those who confess it do not know the makeup of either? I will add, how many are there who profess themselves students of those two parts of man, and have often proved themselves mere fools as to both? And I will conclude that there is not a man under heaven who knows it all completely. For man is “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Ps 139:14), and the manner of the union of these two parts cannot be perfectly found out. How much more, then, must we of necessity be at a loss as to the fullness of the knowledge of the love of Christ? But to go on.

Reason 3. Whoever knows the love of Christ completely must first know not only all the wiles of the devil, but also all the plottings, contrivings, designs and attempts of that wicked one. Yes, he must know all the times the devil has been with God, together with all the requests he has made for leave to fall on us, as on Job and Peter, to try whether he might swallow us up (Job 1-2; Luke 22:31). But who knows all this? No man, no angel. For if the heart of man is so deep that no one but God can tell, from all a man’s actions, the utmost secrets that are in it, how should the heart of angels, which in all likelihood is deeper, be found out by any mortal man? And yet this must be found out before we can find out the utmost of the love of Christ to us. I conclude, therefore, from all these things, that the love of Christ passes knowledge: that is, that its bottom, its utmost bounds, can by no means be understood.

Reason 4. Whoever will presume to say that this love of Christ can be known by us to the utmost must presume to say that he knows the utmost of the merits of Christ’s blood, the utmost exercise of his patience, the utmost of his intercession, and the utmost of the glory that he has prepared and taken possession of for us. But I presume that there is no one who can know all this. Therefore I may assert without any fear that there is no one who knows the love of Christ: that is, who knows it to the full.

We come now to speak more particularly of the knowledge of the love of Christ. We have spoken of the love of Christ, and of the exceeding greatness of it; and now we come, third, to speak of the knowledge of it. That is to say, we will show what knowledge of Christ’s love is attainable in this world, under these three heads. First, it may be known as to its nature. Second, it may be known in many of its degrees. Third, the greatest knowledge that we can have of it here is to know that it passes knowledge.

First, we may know it in its nature. That is, we may know that it is love free, divine, heavenly, everlasting, incorruptible. No love is like this except the love of Christ; all other love is either corruptible, transient, mixed, or earthly. It is divine, for it is the love of the holy nature of God. It is heavenly, because it is from above. It is everlasting, because it has no end. It is immortal, because there is no appearance of corruptibleness in it, nor any likelihood of decay.

This is general knowledge, and it is common among the saints, at least in the notion of it. Though I confess that in a time of temptation it is hard, in practice, to hold the soul fast to all these things.

But, as I have said already, this love of Christ must be such, because love in its root is essential to his nature, as I have also now proved. As the root is, so are the branches; and as the spring is, so are the streams, unless the channels in which those streams run should be corrupted and so defile it. But I know of no channels through which this love of Christ is conveyed to us except those made in his side, his hands, and his feet, and the like; or those gracious promises that dropped like honey from his holy lips in the day of his love, when he spoke them. And seeing that his love is conveyed to us through those channels, and so by the conduit of the holy and blessed Spirit of God to our hearts, it cannot be that it has been corrupted along the way.

I know that the cisterns, that is, our hearts, into which it is conveyed, are unclean. By the damper they may put on it, they may take away much of its native savor and sweetness. I know also that there are those who tread down and muddy those streams with their feet (Ezek 34:18-19). But neither the love nor the channels in which it runs should bear the blame for this. And I hope that those who are saints indeed will not only be preserved to eternal life, but nourished with this, which is incorruptible, until the day of Christ.

I told you before that in the hour of temptation it will be hard for the soul to hold fast to these things, that is, to the true definition of this love. For then, at such seasons, we will admit nothing but that the love of Christ is either transient or mixed. We reckon that we cannot be loved for long unless something better than we yet see in ourselves is found there, to induce Christ to love our poor souls and to go on loving them (Isa 64:6). But the Christian at length gets over these thoughts. For he sees by experience that he has no such inducement in himself (Deut 9:5); and also that Christ loves freely, and not for, or because of, such poor, feeble, imaginary enticements (Ezek 16:60-62).

In this way, then, the love of Christ may be known, that is, in its nature. It may, I say, but not easily (Ezek 36:25-33). For this knowledge is not easily gotten, though it may be gotten, nor easily kept, though it may be kept. There is nothing Satan sets himself against more than the breaking forth of the love of Christ in its own proper native luster. For he knows that it destroys his kingdom, which stands in profaneness, in errors and delusions; and the only thing that destroys that kingdom is the knowledge of this love of Christ (2 Cor 5:14).

What do those swarms of opinions in the world mean? What is the reason that some are carried about like clouds with a tempest? What do men’s waverings mean, their changing and exchanging truth for error, and one error for another? Why, this is the thing: the devil is in it. This work is his. He stirs up all this commotion to raise a dust, and a dust to darken the light of the gospel with. And if he once achieves that, then farewell to the true knowledge of the love of Christ.

He will also assault the spirits of Christians with various and sundry thoughts, of a kind that tends to darken the judgment, delude the imagination, and abuse the conscience. He has an art of transforming all things. He can make God seem to us a most fierce and terrible destroyer, and Christ a terrible exactor of obedience, and astonishingly stingy with his love. He can make supposed sins seem unpardonable, and unpardonable ones appear as virtues. He can make the law be received as gospel, and cause the gospel to be thrown away as a fable. He can persuade people that faith is fancy, and that fancy is the best faith in the world. Besides this, he can tickle the heart with a false hope of a better life hereafter, as if the love of Christ were there.

But, as I said before, the true love of Christ, rightly known, delivers from all these things those who have it shed abroad in their hearts by the Holy Spirit whom he has given (Rom 5). It is for this purpose, therefore, that Christ bids us to continue in his love (John 15:9). For the right knowledge and faith of that love disperses and drives away from the soul all such fogs and mists of darkness. It makes the soul sit fast in the promise of eternal life by him; yes, and grow up into him who is the head, “in all things” (Eph 4:15).

Before I leave this head, I will present my reader with the following things as helps to the knowledge of the love of Christ (I mean the knowledge of its nature), and as helps to retain it.

First help. Know yourself, what a vile, horrible, abominable sinner you are. For you cannot know the love of Christ before you know the badness of your nature. “O wretched man that I am” (Rom 7:24) must come first, before a man can perceive the nature of the love of Christ. He who sees but little of himself will hardly know much of the love of Christ. He who sees nothing at all of himself will hardly ever see anything of the love of Christ. But he who sees most of what an abominable wretch he is, is likely to see most of what the love of Christ is.

All errors in doctrine take their rise from the lack of this (I mean errors in doctrine concerning justification). All the idolizing of men’s virtues and of human inventions also rises from the lack of this. So then, if a man would be kept sure and steadfast, let him labor above all things to know his own wretchedness. People naturally think that the knowledge of their sins is the way to destroy them, when in very deed it is the first step to salvation.

Now if you want to know your own badness, begin by studying the law, then your heart, and so your life. You must look into the law, for that is the glass. You must look upon your heart, for that is the face. You must look upon your life, for that is the body of a man as to religion (Jas 1:25). And without careful consideration of these three, it is not to be thought that a man can come to the knowledge of himself, and consequently to the knowledge of the love of Christ (Jas 1:26-27).

Second help. Labor to see the emptiness, the shortness, and the pollution that cling to a man’s own righteousness. This also must in some measure be known before a man can know the nature of the love of Christ. Those who see nothing of the loathsomeness of man’s best things will think that the love of Christ is of such a nature as to be procured or won, obtained or purchased, by man’s good deeds. And although so much gospel light has broken forth as to stop men’s mouths from saying this, yet nothing but a sound conviction of the vileness of man’s righteousness will enable men to see that the love of Christ is of such a nature as to save a man without it, and to justify him without it. I say, without it, or not at all.

There is shortness, there is hypocrisy, there is a desire for vainglory, there is pride, there is presumption in man’s own righteousness. Nor can it be free of these wickednesses when men do not know the nature of the love of Christ. Now these defile it and make it abominable. Yes, if there were no imperfection in it but the one I mentioned first, that is, shortness, how could it cover the nakedness of the one who has it? Or how could it obtain for the man, in whole or in part, that Christ should love him and have regard for him?

You have been given many occasions to see the emptiness of man’s own righteousness, but none of them will do unless you have help from heaven. Your wisdom therefore will be, if you can tell where to find it, to put yourself in God’s way. Then when he comes to visit those who wait on him in the means he himself has appointed, you may be there. Perhaps he will cast an eye of pity on your desolate soul and make you see the things mentioned above, so that you may know the nature of the love of Christ.

Third help. If you want to know the nature of this love, be much in acquainting your soul with the nature of the law and the nature of the gospel (Gal 3:21). Though these are not diametrically opposed to one another, they still set things before a man so differently that if he does not know where, when, and how to take them, he cannot help but confuse them; and in confusing them he will lose his own soul (Rom 9:31-32). The law is a servant to the gospel, both first and last (Rom 10:3-4). Therefore, when it is made a lord, it destroys. And to be sure, it is made a lord and a savior whenever its dictates and commands are depended on for life.

Your wisdom therefore will be to study these things distinctly and thoroughly. For as far as you are ignorant of the true knowledge of their nature, so far you are ignorant of the true knowledge of the nature of the love of Christ. Read Paul to the Galatians. That epistle was written by the Holy Spirit on purpose to direct the soul in and about this very thing.

Fourth help. The right knowledge of the nature of the love of Christ is obtained and retained by keeping these two doctrines at an everlasting distance as far as the conscience is concerned. That is, I must not allow the law to rule anywhere but over my outward man, and I must not allow the gospel to be removed one hair’s breadth from my conscience. When Christ dwells in my heart by faith (Eph 3:17), and the moral law dwells in my members (Col 3:5), the one to keep up peace with God, the other to keep my conduct in good order, then I am right, and not until then.

But this will not be done without much experience, diligence, and delight in Christ. For there is nothing Satan desires more than that the law should abide in the conscience of an awakened Christian and there take the place of Christ and faith. He knows that if he can obtain this, the veil is immediately drawn over the face of the soul, and the heart is darkened as to the knowledge of Christ (2 Cor 3:13-15). And once darkened, the man is driven into despair of mercy, or else is set to work for life. Therefore, as I say, much diligence is required of anyone who will keep these two in the places God has assigned them. I mean much diligent study of the word, diligent prayer, and diligence to walk with God in the world. But we will pass over this and come to the second head.

Second, as the love of Christ may be known in its nature, so it may be known in many degrees of it. Whatever is knowable admits of degrees of knowledge, and the love of Christ is knowable. Again, whatever cannot possibly be known to the utmost can be known we know not how far. Therefore those who seek to know it should never be contented or satisfied with whatever degree of its knowledge they attain, but should still be reaching forward, because there is more of it to be known before them. “Brethren,” said Paul, “I count not myself to have apprehended” (that is, to the utmost), “but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil 3:13-14).

Since I am on this head of reaching after the knowledge of the love of Christ in many of its degrees, I might discourse here of many things. But I will content myself with a few.

1. Whoever would know the love of Christ in its several degrees must begin at his person, for in him dwell all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. No, more: in him “are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col 2:3). In him, that is, in his person. For the Godhead of Christ and our nature to be united in one person is the highest mystery, and the first appearance of the love of Christ, by himself, to the world (1 Tim 3:16). Here, I say, lie hidden the treasures of wisdom; and here, to the world, spring forth the riches of his love (John 1:14).

That the eternal Word should come down from heaven and be made flesh for the salvation of sinners is an act of such condescension, a discovery of such love, that it can never be fully found out. Only here we may see that love in him was deep, was broad, was long, and was high. Let us therefore begin here first to learn to know the love of Christ in its high degrees.

(1) Here, in the first place, we perceive love in this: that the human nature, the nature of man and not of angels, is taken into union with God. Whoever could consider this as fully as it is possible to consider it would stand amazed until he died of wonder. By this very act of the heavenly wisdom we have an inconceivable pledge of the love of Christ to man. For since he has taken our nature into union with himself, what does it signify but that he intends to take our persons into union with himself? For this very purpose he assumed our nature. Therefore we read that in the flesh he took upon himself, in that flesh, he died for us, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God (1 Pet 3:18).

(2) As he was made flesh, so, as was said before, he became a public, representative person for us. And by this another degree of his love is perceived: he undertook to do for his own what it was not possible for them to do for themselves. He perfected righteousness to the very end of the law, and he acted for us to reconcile us to his Father and to himself (Rom 10:3-4; Rom 3:24).

(3) Herein also we may attain another degree of the knowledge of his love, by understanding that he has conquered our foes and so disabled them that they cannot now carry out their intended enmity against us (Rom 5; Eph 5:26-27). Rather, when Satan, death, the grave, and sin have done to his people whatever they can possibly do, we shall still be more than conquerors over them (though there are many disadvantages on our side), through him who has loved us (Rom 8:37).

(4) By this also we may see still more of his love: that as a forerunner he has gone into heaven to take possession of it for us (Heb 6:20), there to make ready and prepare for us our summer houses, our mansions, our dwelling places. As if we were the lords, and he the servant (John 14:2-3)! Oh, this love!

(5) We may also see another degree of his love in this: that now, in his absence, he has sent the third person in the Trinity to take his place as another Comforter to us (John 16:7; John 15:26), so that we may not think he has forgotten us, nor be left destitute of one to reveal truth to us (John 14:16). Yes, he has sent him to fortify our spirits and to strengthen us under all adversity, and against our enemies of whatever rank or degree (Luke 21:15).

(6) In this also we may see still more of the love of Christ: that though he is in heaven and we are on earth, nothing can happen to his people to hurt them but he feels it, is touched by it, and counts it as done to himself. Yes, he sympathizes with them, and is afflicted and grieved in their griefs and their afflictions.

(7) Another thing by which still more of the love of Christ is made manifest, and so may be known by us, is this. He is now, and has been ever since his ascension into glory, spending himself as High Priest for us (Heb 7:24-26). He does this so that by putting his merits to work before the throne of grace by way of intercession, he may preserve us from the ruin that our daily infirmities would bring upon us (Heb 8:12); yes, and make our persons and our services acceptable in his Father’s sight (Rom 5:10; 1 Pet 2:5).

(8) We also see still more of his love in this: that he will have us where he himself is, so that we may behold his glory and share in it (John 17:24). And in this degree of his love there are many loves.

Then he will come for us as a bridegroom for his bride (Matt 25:6-10). Then a public marriage shall be solemnized, and made eternal, between him and his church (Rev 19:6-7). Then she shall be wrapped in his mantles and robes of glory (Col 3:4). Then they shall be separated, yes, separated, from other sinners, and all things that offend shall be taken away from among them (Matt 25:31; Matt 13:41). Then they shall be exalted to thrones and to the power of judgment. They shall also sit in judgment on sinful men and fallen angels, concurring by virtue of authority with their King and Head in his judgment upon them (1 Cor 6:2-3). Then, and from then on forever, there shall be no more death, sorrow, hidings of his face, or eclipsing of their glory (Luke 20:36).

And so you may see what rungs this Jacob’s ladder of ours has, and how by them we may climb, and climb, until we have climbed up to heaven. But now we are brought to a stand again. For all the glories, all the benefits, all the blessings, and all the good things that are laid up in heaven for these: who can understand them?

2. A second thing by which the love of Christ may be known in some degrees of it is this: that he should pass by angels and take hold of us. Whoever considers the nature of spirits, as they are God’s workmanship, must confess that as such they have a preeminence above what is made of dust. This, then, was the disparity between us and them: they were by birth far more noble than we. But now, when both had fallen, and by our fall were both in a state of condemnation, that Jesus Christ should choose to take up us, the most inconsiderable, and pass by them to their eternal perdition and destruction: O love! Love in a high degree to man! For truly he took not hold of angels, but of the seed of Abraham he took hold (Heb 2:16).

Yet this is not all. In all probability this Lord Jesus has ten times as much to do, now that he has undertaken to be our Savior, as he would have had if he had stepped over us and taken hold of them.

(1) He would not have needed to stoop so low as to take flesh upon himself, theirs being a more noble nature.

(2) Nor, in all likelihood, would he have met with such contempt, such scorn, such reproaches and belittling from them as he has received all along in this undertaking of his, and has met with from sinful flesh. For they were more noble than we, and would sooner have perceived the design of grace. And so, one would think, they would have fallen in with it more readily than creatures in such darkness as we were, and by sin still are.

(3) They would not have had the same disadvantages as we have, for they would not have had a tempter, a destroyer, as strong and mighty as ours is. Alas! Had God left us and taken them, however full of envy against their salvation we might have been, yet being only flesh, what could we have done to them to lay obstacles in the way of their faith and hope, as they can and do in ours?

(4) It may fairly be presumed that if they had been taken and we left, and they had been made partakers in our stead while we were shut out as they are, they would not have put Christ to so much trouble, now that he is in heaven (please bear with the expression, because I lack a better one), as we by our imperfections have done and still do. Sin, it seems to me, would not have clung to their natures as it does to ours. Their reason, sense, and understanding are quicker, and so would have been more apt to be taken with this love of Christ, and more easily sanctified by it.

(5) The law they have broken is not as intricate as the one we have offended against. Theirs was a commandment to abide faithfully in the place in which their Creator had set them. It seems to me, considering also the aptness of their natures as angels, that it would not have made their complete obedience so difficult.

(6) Nor can I imagine otherwise than that, had they been taken, they, as creatures excelling in strength, would have been more capable of rendering praise and blessing to God for eternal mercies than such poor, sorry creatures as we are could ever be. But! “Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the children of God” (1 John 3:1). That we, not they; that we, in spite of all that they have done or could do to hinder it, should be called the children of God!

This, therefore, is a high degree of the love of Jesus Christ to us: that when we and they had fallen, he should stoop and take up us, the less noble, and leave so mighty a creature to perish in his sins.

3. A third thing by which the love of Christ may be known in some of its degrees will be to consider more particularly the way, and the unwearied work, that he has with man to bring him to that kingdom which he has obtained for him by his blood.

(1) When the Lord Jesus takes a man in hand to make him a partaker of the benefit, the man is found to be an enemy to his Redeemer. Nor does all the news he has heard of the grace and love of Christ to such as he is soften him at all, that is, before the day of God’s power comes (Rom 4:5; Rom 5:7-10). And this is a strange thing. If man, though he could not have come to Christ, had been willing for Christ to come to him, that would have been something. It would have shown that he had taken his grace to heart and considered it, yes, and that he was willing to share in it. But truly, there is no such thing here. Though man has free will, he is by no means willing to be saved God’s way, that is, by Jesus Christ, before (as was said before) the day of God’s power comes upon him.

When the good shepherd went to look for his sheep that was lost in the wilderness, and had found it, did it go one step homeward on its own legs? Did not the shepherd take it and lay it on his shoulder, and bring it home rejoicing (Luke 15)? This, then, is not love only, but love to a degree.

(2) When a man is taken and laid under the day of God’s power, when Christ is opening his ear to discipline and speaking to him so that his heart may receive instruction, many times that poor man acts as if the devil had found him, and not God. How wildly he imagines! How perversely he thinks! How awkwardly he carries himself under convictions and counsels, and in his present understanding of things! I know some are dealt with more powerfully, and are more strongly bound at first by the world; but others are dealt with more in an ordinary manner, so that the flesh and reason may be seen, to the glory of Christ. Yes, and where the will is made to comply with its salvation more quickly, it is no thanks to the sinner at all (Job 4:18). It is the day of the power of the Lord that has made the work appear so soon. Therefore count this an act of love, in the height of love; love in a great degree (John 15:16).

(3) When Christ Jesus has made this mad man come to himself, and has persuaded him to be willing to accept his salvation, even then he cannot be trusted or left alone. For then the corruptions that still lie scattered up and down in his flesh will tempt him away, and he will be gone. Yes, the flesh of saints is so desperately wicked that if they were left to themselves only a little while, no one knows what horrible transgressions would break out. We have proof of this, to our amazement, plentifully scattered here and there in the word. This is why the patience of God and his gentleness are so admired (2 Chr 32:21), for it is through them that his people are preserved. He who keeps Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps (Ps 121:4), but watches for them and over them every moment, for he knows that otherwise they will be hurt (Isa 27:3).

(4) Yes, in spite of this, how often are saints found playing truant, and lurking like thieves in one hole or another: now in the guilt of backsliding by the power of this corruption, and then in filth by the power of that one (Jer 2:26)! Yes, and when they are found in such decline and in such revolts from God, how commonly they hide their sin, like Adam and David, until their Savior fires a confession of the truth of their wickedness out of their mouths. “When I kept silence,” said David (and yet he chose to keep silence after he had committed his wickedness), “my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me, my moisture is turned into the drought of summer” (Ps 32:3-4). But why didn’t you confess what you had done then? So I did, he says, at last; and, “thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin” (Ps 32:5).

(5) When the sins of saints are so visible and evident to others that God, to vindicate his name and honor, must punish them in the sight of others (yes, must do it, because he is just), even then, for Christ’s sake, he waives such judgments. He refuses to inflict such punishments as naturally tend to their destruction, and chooses instead to chastise them with such rods and scourges as may do them good in the end, so that they may not be condemned with the world (1 Cor 11:31-32). Therefore the Lord loves them, and they are blessed whom he chastens and teaches out of his law (Heb 12:5-8; Ps 94:12). And these things are love to a degree.

(6) That Christ should supply out of his fullness the beginnings of grace in our souls, and carry on that work of so great concern, and that which at times we think so little of, is not the least of the things that heighten the love of Christ to his people. And this work is as common as any of the works of Christ, and as necessary to our salvation as his righteousness is, and the imputation of it to our justification. For otherwise how could we hold out to the end (Matt 24:13)? And yet no one else can be saved.

(7) And that the love of Christ should be such toward us that he will act like this, and do this to us and for us, with gladness (as was shown earlier by the parable of the lost sheep), is another degree of his love toward us; and one, too, that is not of the lowest rank. I have seen hot love soon grow cold. And I have seen love that kept on acting, yet acted toward the end like a man who has run himself off his legs, who pants and can hardly run any longer. But I never saw love like the love of Christ, who, like a giant, like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and like a strong man, rejoices to run his race (Ps 19:5). He loves higher and higher, stronger and stronger: I mean as to the letting out of his love, for he keeps the best wine until the last (John 2:10).

(8) I will conclude with this: his love may be known in many of its degrees by the sort of sinners whose salvation he most rejoices in, and that is the salvation of sinners of the biggest size: great sinners, Jerusalem sinners, Samaritan sinners, publican sinners. I might also point out how he has proportioned invitations, promises and examples of his love for the encouragement and support of those whose souls would trust in him; and by these, too, great degrees of his love may be understood. But we will now come to the third thing that was proposed.

Third, the greatest attainment we can arrive at here, as to understanding the love of Christ, is to know that it passes knowledge: “And to know the love of Christ that passeth knowledge” (Eph 3:19). This truth shows itself:

1. By the text itself. For the apostle here, in this prayer of his for the Ephesians, does not only desire that they may know; he also describes the thing he prays they may know by this term: it passeth knowledge. “And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge.” Our reason and fleshly imagination will be rudely and wrongly tampering with anything that belongs to Christ, and especially with the love and kindness of Christ. They judge and conclude that his love is just such as they can grasp, and nothing more. Yes, and they will insist on believing that the dimensions of this love are just so and no other, and that it cannot save beyond our fleshly ideas of it. They say to the soul, as Pharaoh once said to Israel in another case, “Let the Lord be with you as I shall” (judge it fit that he should) “let you go” (Exod 10:10).

We think Christ loves us no more than we think he can, and so we conclude that his love is something we can comprehend, or know to its utmost bounds. But these are false ideas. The love of Christ that we think is like this is in fact no love of Christ at all, but a false image of it set before our eyes. I do not speak now of weak knowledge, but of foolish and bold conclusions. A man may think through unbelief that Christ has no love for him, and yet Christ may love him with a love that passes knowledge. But when men, in the ordinary course of their profession of religion, will always come to rest here, that they know how Christ can love and how far; and when they will then boldly conclude from this that they themselves are safe, and that all who do not hold the same notions, opinions, forms or judgments as they do are lost and ruined, this is the worst and greatest error of all. Therefore, to correct those false and mistaken conclusions, the text says, It is a love that passeth knowledge.

And it is worth noticing that men, erroneous men, do not put these limits on the Father and his love as commonly as they put them on the Son and his. That is why you have some who boast that God can save some who have no knowledge of the person of the Mediator, Jesus Christ the righteous: for example, the heathen who have made, and still make, great use of the law and light of nature. They cry out with disdain against the narrowness, rigidness, censoriousness and pride of those who think otherwise. And all the while they are not ashamed to eclipse, degrade, lessen and undervalue the love of Jesus Christ. They make him, and his undertaking to offer himself as a sacrifice to appease the justice of God for our sins, a matter of indifference, in its own nature no more than other smaller matters.

But all this while the devil knows full well what game he is playing. For he knows that without Christ, without faith in his blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. So he says, “Let these men talk all they like about the greatness of the love of God as Creator, so long as they slight and undervalue the love of Christ as Mediator.” And yet it is worth our consideration that the greatness of the love of God is most fully expressed in his giving Christ to be a Savior, and in bestowing Christ’s benefits on us so that we may be happy through him.

But to return. The love of Christ that really is his love is a love that passes knowledge; and the best and highest of our knowledge of it is that we know it to be such.

2. Because I find that the great men of God of old used to stop at this point; here they were set fast, and beyond it they could not go. It was this that made Moses wonder (Deut 4:31-34). It was this that made David cry out how great and wonderful the works of God are: “Thy thoughts to usward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered” (Ps 40:5). And again: “How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand” (Ps 139:17-18). And a little before: “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me” (Ps 139:6). Isaiah says that it has not entered into the heart of man what God has prepared for those who wait for him (Isa 64:4). Ezekiel says this is the river that cannot be crossed (Ezek 47:5). And Micah has compared this unsearchable love to the sea (Mic 7:19), and Zechariah to a fountain (Zech 13:1).

So the apostle’s position, that the love of Christ is that which passes knowledge, is a truth not to be doubted. Consequently, to know this, and that it is such, is the farthest we can go. To do this is to justify God, who has said it, and to magnify the Son, who has loved us with such a love. And to do the opposite is to dishonor him, to lessen him, and to make him a deficient Savior.

For suppose it were true that you could comprehend this love to the utmost. Yet unless your knowledge could also reach beyond all the evil of sin, beyond the farthest that the sins of anyone who will be saved can spread or infect, you would have to leave some pardonable person in an unpardonable condition. For you would comprehend this love and yet be unable to comprehend that sin. This makes Christ a deficient Savior. Besides, if you truly comprehend it, then the word that says it passes knowledge has lost its sacredness, its truth.

It must be, therefore, that this love passes knowledge, and that the highest point a person can reach by knowledge in this matter is to know that it passes knowledge. My reason is this: all degrees of love, however high they are, or however many and high, still lie within the bounds of our knowledge if we can comprehend them. For only what is beyond us is what passes knowledge. What we can reach cannot be the highest. And if a man thinks there is nothing beyond what he can reach, he has no further knowledge about it. But if he knows that, besides what he has already reached, there is something before him that he cannot reach, then he has knowledge of that too: the knowledge that it passes knowledge.

It is true that a man who knows in this way may have various guesses about the thing that is beyond his knowledge. Indeed, it is only reasonable that he should, because he knows that something still lies before him. But since the thing itself is truly beyond his knowledge, none of his guesses about it can be counted as knowledge. Or suppose a man who guesses in this way should happen to hit on the truth about what he now guesses at. Even so, his hitting on it may not be called knowledge. It is still only an uncertain guess to him, and it is still beyond his knowledge.

Question. But someone may say, “What good will it do a man to know that the love of Christ passes knowledge? You would think it would do a person more good to believe that the knowledge of the whole love of Christ might be attained.”

Answer. That there is an advantage in knowing that the love of Christ passes knowledge must not be questioned, for the apostle says that there is (2 Tim 3:16). For to know what the holy word affirms is profitable. Nor would he pray that we might know that which passes knowledge if our knowing it did not bring us some help. But let me show you some of the advantages that will come to us by knowing that the love of Christ passes knowledge.

(1) By knowing this, a child of God has something in reserve for himself against a day when everything else he knows may be taken from him by the power of temptation. Sometimes a good man may be so hard pressed that all that he knows with full understanding may be taken from him: that is, the knowledge that his faith is true, or that he has the grace of God in him, or the like. This, I say, may be taken from him. Now if at such a time he knows the love of Christ that passes knowledge, he knows a way by which, in all probability, he may be recovered again. For if Christ Jesus loves with a love that passes knowledge, then the soul that is in the dark like this says, “He may love me yet, for all I know; for I know that he loves with a love that passes knowledge. And therefore I will not utterly despair.”

Yes, if Satan should try to question whether Christ Jesus will ever look on me or not, the answer is ready, if I know the love that passes knowledge: “But he may look on me, Satan; yes, and love me and save me too, for all that I, a poor sinner, know; for he loves with a love that passes knowledge.” If I have fallen into a sin that lies heavy on me, and my conscience fears that there is no forgiveness for it, the help that keeps me from utter despair is at hand: “But there may be,” I say, “for Christ loves with a love that passes knowledge.” If Satan would talk me out of praying to God by suggesting that Christ would not regard my stammering, chattering prayer, the answer is ready: “But he may regard it, for all I know; for he loves with a love that passes knowledge.” If the tempter suggests that your trials and troubles and afflictions are so many that it is to be expected you will never get beyond them, the answer is near: “But for all we know, Christ may carry me through them all; for he loves with a love that passes knowledge.”

So, I say, relief is at hand, and help is in reserve for the tempted, let their temptations be what they will. This, therefore, is the weapon that will baffle the devil when all other weapons fail: “For all I know, Christ may save me, for he loves with a love that passes knowledge.” Yes, suppose the devil should drive me to the worst of fears, which is to doubt that I either have or ever shall have the grace of God in my soul. The answer is at hand: “But I have it, or may have it, for Christ loves with a love that passes knowledge.”

So you may see that there is a great deal of good in this prayer of Paul’s. When he prays that we might know the love of Christ that passes knowledge, he is praying that we may have help at hand, and relief against all the horrible temptations of the devil. For this is help at hand, help that is ready to join with us, if there still remains in us even the least grain of right reasoning according to the nature of things. For suppose someone charges a man with being poor because he has only a fourpenny piece in his pocket; if he has an untold amount of money in his trunks, how easily he can clear himself of that slander by turning the knowledge of what he has back on the one who accused him! This is the case, and so it is and will be with those who know the love of Christ that passes knowledge.

(2) Therefore, by this knowledge, room is made for a Christian, and liberty is given him to turn himself every way in all spiritual things. This is the Christian’s Rehoboth, that well which the Philistines have no heart to fight over, and which will make us fruitful in the land (Gen 26:22).

If Christians do not know with this knowledge, they walk in the world as if their arms were pinned, or as if fetters were hung on their heels. But this enlarges their steps under them (2 Sam 22:37). By the knowledge of this love they may walk at liberty, and their steps will not be cramped. This is what Solomon means when he says, “Get wisdom, and get understanding” (Prov 4:5). Then “when thou goest, thy steps shall not be straitened, and when thou runnest, thou shalt not stumble” (Prov 4:12).

A man who lives only from hand to mouth is often hard put to it to know how to spend his penny, and many times he comes away with a hungry belly anyway. But the man who has not only that much, but always more than enough and some to spare, is more at liberty; he can live in plenty, and far more like a gentleman. Here is a man who has a cistern, and it is full of water. Here is another, who also has his cistern full, and his spring in his yard besides. But a great drought comes on the land where they live. Now I would like to know which of these two has the greater advantage to live at liberty in his own mind, without fear of running out of water.

Why, this is the case in hand. Here is a Christian who knows Christ in all those degrees of his love that are knowable, but knows nothing of Christ in his love that passes knowledge. Here is another Christian, who knows Christ as the first does, but who also knows him in his love that passes knowledge. Now please tell me: which of these two is the more likely to live most like a Christian, that is, like a spiritual prince, and like one who possesses all things? Which has the greater advantage to live in godly largeness of heart, and is most at liberty in his mind? Which of these two has the greater advantage to believe, and the greater obligations laid on him to love the Lord Jesus? And which of these has the most in readiness to resist the schemes of the devil, and to subdue the power and prevailing strength of corruptions?

It is this that makes men fathers in Christianity: “I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known; … I have written unto you, fathers, because ye have known” (1 John 2:13-14). Why, have not others known? Not as the fathers have. The fathers have known and known. They have known the love of Christ in those degrees of love that are knowable, and they have also known the love of Christ to be such that it passes knowledge. In my father’s house is bread enough and to spare: that was what brought the prodigal home (Luke 15:17). And when Moses wanted to set an endless all before Israel, for the comfort and support of their souls, he called their God “The fountain of Jacob upon a land of corn and wine” (Deut 33:28).

(3) By this knowledge, that is, by knowing the love of Christ that passes knowledge, a greater desire is born in Christians to press forward to what lies before them (Phil 3:12-21). What is the reason for all the sloth, fleshly contentment and listlessness of spirit among Christians, if not ignorance of this? For the man who thinks he knows all that can be known is beyond the reach of every reason that might move him to seek still more. Now the love of Christ may be said not to be knowable on a threefold account: because my knowledge is weak; because my knowledge is imperfect; or because, however perfect my knowledge might be, the love of Christ is eternal.

There is love that cannot be grasped by weak knowledge. Convince a man of this, and then, if the knowledge of what he already has is truly sweet to his soul (Prov 2:10), it will stir him up to desire with great heartiness to know whatever more of it is possible.

There is love beyond what is already known by the man who is endowed with the most perfect knowledge that anyone may have here. Now if what this man already knows of this love is truly sweet to him, it sets him on heartfelt desires that his soul may know still more. And because no limit is set to how much a man may know of it in this life, his desires, notwithstanding all he has attained, are still kept alive, and kept in pursuit of the knowledge of more of the love of Christ. And in times past God has been so pleased with some of his people for the greatness of their desires that when they had known, so to speak, as much on earth as it was possible for them to know (that is, by ordinary means), he came down to them in visions and revelations, or else took them up to himself into paradise for an hour or two, so that they might know, and then let them down again.

But this is not all. There is a knowledge of the love of Christ that we are in no way capable of until we are in possession of heaven. And I would like to know, if a man truly loves Christ, whether believing this is not one of the strongest arguments that can be urged to make such a man weary of this world, so that he may be with him. To such a man, “to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Phil 1:21-23). And it is hard for such a man to bring his mind to be content to stay here any longer, unless he is satisfied that Christ still has work for him to do here.

I will add something more. There is a love of Christ that, I will not say cannot be known, but I will say cannot be enjoyed; no, not even by those who are now in heaven (in soul) until the day of judgment. And the knowledge of this, when it has taken hold even of men on earth, has made them choose a day of judgment over a day of death, so that they might know what lies beyond that state and knowledge which even the spirits of just men made perfect now enjoy in heaven (2 Cor 5:4). Therefore, as I said at first, to know the love of Christ that passes knowledge is advantageous on this account: it produces in Christians a great desire to reach out and press forward to what lies before them.

One thing more, and then I am done with this reason. Even that love of Christ that is absolutely unknowable as to its utmost bounds, because it is eternal, will still be sweet and desirable in its nature, because we shall enjoy it, or be possessed of it, so: eternally. This, therefore, if there were nothing more, is enough, once it is known, to draw the heart away from things below to itself.

(4) The love that passes knowledge: the knowledge of that is a very fruitful knowledge. It cannot be anything but fruitful. Some knowledge is empty and alone, not accompanied by the good and the blessings that accompany this knowledge. Did I say it is fruitful? I will add that it is accompanied by the best fruit; it yields the best wine. It fills the soul with all the fullness of God: “And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled with all the fulness of God” (Eph 3:19). God is in Christ, and makes himself known to us by the love of Christ. “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God”; for God is not to be found or enjoyed except in him. Consequently, he that has and abides in the doctrine of Christ “hath both the Father and the Son” (2 John 9).

Now, there are degrees of knowledge of this doctrine, and the highest degree of the knowledge of him is to know that he has a love that passes knowledge. It follows, then, that if he who has the least saving knowledge of this doctrine has God, he who has the largest knowledge of it has God much more; or, in the words of the text, he is filled with all the fullness of God.

What this fullness of God is may best be gathered from those sayings of the Holy Spirit that come nearest to this one in language, filled:

Full of goodness (Rom 15:14).

Full of faith (Acts 6:5).

Full of the Holy Ghost (Acts 7:55).

Full of assurance of faith (Heb 10:22).

Full of assurance of hope (Heb 6:11).

Full of joy unspeakable, and full of glory (1 Pet 1:8).

Full of joy (1 John 1:4).

Full of good works (Acts 9:36).

Being filled with the knowledge of his will (Col 1:9).

Being filled with the Spirit (Eph 5:18).

Filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God (Phil 1:11).

These things, to be sure, are included here either as the cause or as the effect of this fullness. The cause they cannot be, for that belongs to God, by his Holy Spirit. Therefore they are the effects. For wherever God dwells in the degree intended in the text, these things show in an eminent manner “what is the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints” (Eph 1:18). But these things do not dwell in the measure the text specifies in anyone except those who know the love of Christ which passes knowledge.

But what a man he is who is filled with all these things! Or who is, as we have it in the text, “filled with all the fulness of God!” Such men are lacking in the churches today. These are the men who sweeten churches, and who bring glory to God and to religion. And knowledge will make us such men: such knowledge as the apostle speaks of here.

I have now finished, once I have spoken to you a little by way of use, drawing on what has been said. And so:

Use 1. Is there such breadth and length and depth and height in God for us? And is there love in Christ toward us that passes knowledge? Then this shows us not only the greatness of the majesty of the Father and the Son, but also the great goodwill that is in their heart toward those who receive their word.

God has pledged for us the breadth and length and depth and height of the love, the wisdom, the power, and the truth that are in himself; and Christ has loved us with a love that passes knowledge. We may well say, “Who is like thee, O Lord, among the gods?” (Exod 15:11). Or, as another prophet has it, “Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever: because he delighteth in mercy” (Mic 7:18). Yes, no words can sufficiently set out the greatness of this love of God and his Son to us poor, miserable sinners.

Use 2. Is there so great a heart of love toward us, both in the Father and in the Son? Then let us give ourselves much to the study and search of the greatness of this love. This is the sweetest study a man can devote himself to, because it is the study of the love of God and of Christ to man. Look how closely some people pursue studies that yield far less profit than this, once they have given themselves to them! Men do not usually find it a burden to count over their money, or to go over their lands, their herds, and their flocks again, when these increase. Why, the study of the unsearchable love of God in Christ to man is better in itself, and yields more sweetness to the soul, than ten thousand such things as I have just mentioned.

I know the wise men of this world, of whom there are many, will say of what I am now pressing on you, “Who can show us any good in it?” But “Lord, lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us. Thou hast put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that their corn and their wine increaseth” (Ps 4:6-7). David also said that his meditation on the Lord would be sweet. Oh, there is such kindness in God and in his Son toward the sons of men that, if they knew it, they would want to keep the knowledge of it in their hearts. They would cry out as she did long ago, “Set me as a seal upon thy heart, as a seal upon thine arm: For love is strong as death” (Song 8:6-7).

Every part, crumb, grain, or scrap of this knowledge is to a Christian what drops of honey are to sweet-toothed children: worth gathering up, worth putting to the tongue to be relished. Yes, David says of the word, which is the ground of knowledge, “It is sweeter than honey or the honeycomb. More,” he says, “to be desired are they than gold; yea, than much fine gold; sweeter also than honey or the honeycomb” (Ps 19:10).

Why, then, do Christians not devote themselves to meditating on so heavenly, so good, so sweet, and so comforting a thing, one that brings such advantage to the soul? The reason is that these things are talked about but not believed. If men believed what they say when they speak so largely of the love of God and the love of Jesus Christ, they would meditate on it; they could not help it. There are so many wonders in it, and men love to think about wonders. There is so much profit in it, and men love to think about what brings them profit. But, as I said, belief of these things is lacking.

Belief of a thing will have strong effects, whether the ground for it is true or false. Suppose one of you, while at a neighbor’s house, should believe that your own house was on fire while your children were fast asleep in bed, though in fact there was no such thing. I appeal to any of you whether this belief would not do remarkable work in and upon your heart. Let a man believe he will be damned: though afterward it becomes evident that he believed a lie, yet what work that belief made in his heart! Even so, and much more, will the belief of heavenly things work, because they are true and great and most good. Also, where they are truly believed, their evidence is pressed home upon the spirit by the Holy Spirit’s own power and glory. Therefore let us study these things.

Use 3. Let us cast ourselves upon this love. No greater encouragement can be given us than what is in the text and around it. It is great; it is love that passes knowledge. Men who are aware of their danger are glad when they hear of help they may boldly venture on for their escape. Well, the text leads trembling and fearful consciences to just such a help and relief. Fear and trembling about misery hereafter can flow only from what we know, feel, or imagine. But the text speaks of a love that is beyond what we can know, feel, or imagine, a love that passes knowledge, and consequently a love that goes beyond all these.

Besides, the apostle’s conclusion on this subject plainly shows that the meaning I have put on the text is the mind of the Holy Spirit. “Now unto him,” he says, “that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus, throughout all ages, world without end. Amen” (Eph 3:20-21). What could be plainer? What could be fuller? What could better suit the most despondent spirit in anyone? He can do more than you know he will. He can do more than you think he can.

What do you think? “Why,” says the sinner, “I think that I am cast away.” Well, there are worse thoughts than that, so think again. “Why,” says the sinner, “I think that my sins are as many as the sins of all the world.” This is indeed a very black thought, but there are worse thoughts than this, so please think again. “Why,” says the sinner, “I think that God is not able to pardon all my sins.” Ah, now you have thought indeed! This thought makes you look more like a devil than a man. And yet, because you are a man and not a devil, see the condescension and the boundlessness of the love of your God: He is able to do above all that we think!

Sinner, if you had been allowed to put it into words yourself, could you have expressed the greatness of the love you need in words that would have suited you better? For it is not said that he can do above what we think, meaning our thinking at present, but above all we can think, meaning above the worst and most soul-crushing thoughts we ever have. Sometimes the dejected have worse thoughts than they have at other times. Well, take them at their worst times, when they think and think until they think themselves down into the very pangs of hell. Yet this word of the grace of God is above those thoughts, and shows that he can still recover and save these miserable people.

And now that I am on this subject, I will walk and travel a little further with the despondent, and put a few words in their mouths to help them against temptations that may come upon them later. For as Satan now follows such people with charges and applications of guilt, so he may follow them with interrogations and appeals. He knows how to sink and drown the sinner whose soul he has leave to engage, by appeals as well as by charging him with sin. Suppose, then, that some distressed man or woman should be engaged in this way, and Satan should be busy with them, with his interrogations and appeals, to drive them to desperation. The text last mentioned, to say nothing of the subject of our discourse, yields plenty of help for the relief of such a one.

Says Satan, “Don’t you know that you have sinned horribly?”

“Yes,” says the soul, “I do.”

Says Satan, “Don’t you know that you are one of the vilest in the whole pack of professing Christians?”

“Yes,” says the soul, “I do.”

Says Satan, “Doesn’t your conscience tell you that you are, and have been, more base than any of your fellows can imagine you to be?”

“Yes,” says the soul, “my conscience tells me so.”

“Well,” says Satan, “now I will come at you with my appeals. Are you not a graceless wretch?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have a heart to be sorry for this wickedness?”

“No, not as I should.”

“And although you pray sometimes,” says Satan, “isn’t your heart possessed with a belief that God will not regard you?”

“Yes,” says the sinner.

“Why then, despair, and go hang yourself,” says the devil.

And now we have come to the end that Satan designed and drove at. “But what shall I do now?” says the sinner. I answer: take up the words of the text against him, that Christ loves with a love that passes knowledge, and answer him further, saying, “Satan, though I cannot think that God loves me, though I cannot think that God will save me, yet I will not yield to you, for God can do more than I think he can. And as for your appeal to me, whether, when I pray, my heart is not possessed with unbelief that God will not regard me, that shall not sink me either, for God can do abundantly above what I ask or think.” This is how this text helps when obstacles are thrown in the way of our believing, and so of our casting ourselves upon the love of God in Christ for salvation.

And yet this is not all, for the text is fuller still: “He is able to do abundantly more,” yes, “exceeding abundantly more,” or “above all that we ask or think.” It is a text made up of words picked and packed together by the wisdom of God, picked and packed together on purpose for the help and relief of the tempted, so that in the midst of their distresses they may cast themselves upon the Lord their God. He can do abundantly more than we ask.

“Oh,” says the soul, “if only he would do as much for me as I could ask him to do! How happy a man I would be then!”

Why, what would you ask for, sinner?

“You may be sure,” says the soul, “I would ask to be saved from my sins. I would ask for faith in Christ and love for him. I would ask to be preserved in this evil world, and to be glorified with Christ in heaven.”

He who asks for all this does indeed ask for much, and for more than Satan would have him believe God is able or willing to give him. But notice: the text does not say that God is able to do all that we can ask or think, but that he is able to do above all, yes, abundantly above all, yes, exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. What a text this is! What a God we have! God foresaw the sins of his people, and what work the devil would make with their hearts about them. And therefore, to prevent their ruin by his temptation, he has expressed his love this largely in his word, as you see. Let us therefore, as we have been bidden, make this good use of this doctrine of grace: to cast ourselves upon this love of God in times of distress and temptation.

Use 4. Take heed not to abuse this love. This exhortation seems needless, for love is such a thing that one would think no one could find it in their heart to abuse it. But for all that, I am of the opinion that nothing is more abused among professing Christians today than this love of God. More light about the love of Christ has broken out lately than formerly; every boy can now talk of the love of Christ. But this love of Christ has either not been rightly applied by preachers, or else not rightly received by those who profess it. For never was this grace of Christ so turned into lasciviousness as it is now.

It is now the practice among professing Christians to learn vileness from the profane, yes, and to plead for that vileness. No, let us turn it the other way: it has now come to this, that the profane learn vileness from those who profess. They teach the wicked ones their ways (Jer 2:33), a thing no good man should think of without blushing cheeks.

Jude speaks of these people, and tells us that, for all their profession, they deny the only Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ (Jude 4). “They profess,” says Paul, “that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate” (Titus 1:16).

But I say, do not let this love of God and of Christ be abused. It is unnatural to abuse love. To abuse love is a villainy condemned by all; yes, to abuse love is the most inexcusable sin of all. To abuse love, the love of God and of Christ, is next to the sin of devils.

And what does the apostle say? “Because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved, therefore God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned, who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thess 2:10-12). And what can anyone say for himself at the judgment who is charged with the abuse of love?

Christians, deny yourselves, deny your lusts, deny the vanities of this present life, and devote yourselves to God. Become lovers of God, lovers of his ways, and “a people zealous of good works.” Then you will show one another, and all men, that you have not received the grace of God in vain (2 Cor 6:1). Renounce, therefore, the hidden things of dishonesty; do not walk in craftiness or handle God’s word deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commend yourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God (2 Cor 4:2).

Do this, I say. Yes, and seek such a close union with this love of God in Christ as may graciously constrain you to do it. For when all the proofs of rightly receiving this love of Christ are produced, none will be found of worth enough to justify the sincerity of our profession except the one that makes us “zealous of good works” (Titus 2:14). And what a thing it will be to be turned away at last as one who abused the love of Christ, as one who presumed upon his lusts, this world, and all manner of wickedness because the love of Christ to pardon sins was so great! What a thoughtless, what a base person you will be counted on that day! Yes, you will be found to be the man who made a prey of love, who made a stalking horse of love, who made love a slave to sin, the devil, and the world. And will that not be bad? Read Ezek 16.

Use 5. Is the love of God and of Christ so great? Then let us labor to make the most of it, to the utmost, for our advantage against all the hindrances of faith.

For what other purpose is it revealed, mentioned, and commended to us? We are surrounded by many enemies, and faith in the love of God and of Christ is our only help and shelter. Therefore our duty and wisdom and privilege is to make the most of this love for our own advantage. Turn it against daily infirmities; turn it against the wiles of the devil; turn it against the threats, rage, death, and destruction that the men of this world continually set before you to terrify you.

But how must that be done? Why, set this love, and the safety there is in it, before your eyes, and look at it while these things are making their assaults on you. These words, God loves me, and faith in them, will support you in the midst of whatever dangers may assault you. And this is what is meant when we are exhorted to rejoice in the Lord (Phil 3:1), to make our boast in the Lord (Ps 44), to triumph in Christ (2 Cor 2:14), and to set the Lord always before our face (Ps 16:8). For he who can do this steadfastly cannot be overcome. For in God there is more than can be in the world, either to help or to hinder. Therefore, if God is my helper, if God loves me, if Christ is my Redeemer and has bestowed his love that passes knowledge on me, who can be against me (Heb 13:6; Rom 8:31)? And if they are against me, what disadvantage do I reap from it, since even all this also works for my good? This is making the most of the love of God and of Christ for my advantage.

Christians should also take the same course with the degrees of this love: set it against all the degrees of danger, for here “deep calleth unto deep” (Ps 42:7). Wickedness and rage cannot be worked up to any degree of which it may be said that there are not degrees in the love of God and of Christ to match it. In the thing in which Pharaoh dealt proudly against God’s people, the Lord was above him (Exod 18:11); he matched and overmatched him. He came up to him and went beyond him; he grappled with him, overcame him, and cast him down. “The Lord is a man of war, the Lord is his name. Pharaoh’s chariots and his host hath he cast into the sea … they sank into the bottom as a stone” (Exod 15:3-5). There is no striving against the Lord who has loved us; no one who strives against him can prosper.

If the shields of the earth are the Lord’s (Ps 47:9), then he can wield them for the safeguard of his body, the church. Or if they have become unfit to be used any longer in that way and for such a purpose, can he not lay them aside and make himself new ones? Men can do this sort of thing; much more can God.

But again, if the miseries or afflictions you meet with seem to you to overflow, to go beyond measure, above measure, and so above strength, and begin to drive you to despair of life (2 Cor 1:8), then you also have in the love of God and of Christ something that is above, and goes beyond, all measure too: that is, love unsearchable, unknown, love “that can do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think.” Now God has set the one against the other, and it will be your wisdom to do so too, for this is the way to make the most of this love. But though it is easy to admonish you to do this, you will find the practical part more difficult. So here it may not be amiss if I add to these another head, of counsel.

Counsel 1. Would you, then, make the most of this love of God and of Christ for your advantage? Why, then you must labor after the knowledge of it. This was what the apostle prayed for, for these Ephesians, as was said before; and this is what you must labor after, or else your reading and my writing will be fruitless as far as you are concerned. Let me then say to you, as David said to his son Solomon, “And thou Solomon, my son, know thou the God of thy father” (1 Chr 28:9). Empty notions of this love will do nothing but harm. So it is not empty notions that I press you to rest in; rather, I urge you to labor after the knowledge of the fragrance of this good ointment (Song 1:3), which the apostle calls the fragrance of the knowledge of this Lord Jesus (2 Cor 2:14).

Know it until it becomes sweet or pleasant to your soul, and then it will preserve and keep you (Prov 2:10-11). Make this love of God and of Christ your own, and not another’s. There are many who can talk at length about the love of God to Abraham, to David, to Peter and Paul. But that is not the thing. Do not give up until this love is made your own, until you find and feel it run warm in your heart as it is shed abroad there by the Spirit that God has given you (Rom 5:5). Then you will know it with a knowledge that binds and engages you; yes, then you will know it with a soul-strengthening and soul-encouraging knowledge.

Counsel 2. Would you make the most of this love? Then set it against the love of all other things whatsoever, until this love conquers your soul away from the love of them to itself.

This is the Christian way. Do it, therefore, and say, “Why should anything have my heart but God, but Christ? He loves me; he loves me with a love that passes knowledge. He loves me, and he shall have me. He loves me, and I will love him. His love stripped him of everything for my sake; Lord, let my love strip me of everything for your sake. I am a son of love, an object of love, a monument of love: of free love, of distinguishing love, of special love, and of love that passes knowledge. And why should I not walk in love? In love to God, in love to men, in holy love, in love unfeigned?”

This is the way to make the most of the love of God for your advantage, for the subduing of your passions and the sanctifying of your nature. It is an odious thing to hear men of base lives talking of the love of God, of the death of Christ, and of the glorious grace that is presented to sinners by the word of the truth of the gospel. Praise is fitting for the upright, not for the profane. Therefore let him speak of love who is taken with love, who is captivated with love, who is carried away with love. If this man speaks of it, his speaking means something: the powers and bonds of love are upon him, and he shows everyone that he knows what he is talking about. But the very mention of love in the mouth of the profane is like a parable in the mouth of fools, or like salt that has lost its savor. Therefore, Christian, make the most of this love of God as you should, and it will make the most of you as you would.

Counsel 3. Therefore, if you would make the most of this love, keep yourself in it. “Keep yourselves in the love of God” (Jude 21). This text looks as if it favored the Socinians, but there is nothing of that in it. And so does this one: “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love: even as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love” (John 15:10). The meaning, then, is this: that living a holy life is the way, after a man has believed unto justification, to keep himself in the savor and comfort of the love of God. And oh, that you would indeed do so! I say this because, if you lack the savor of it, you will soon lack tenderness toward the commandment, which is the rule by which you must walk if you would do good to yourself or honor God in the world. “To him that ordereth his conversation aright will I show the salvation of God” (Ps 50:23). He who would live a sweet, comfortable, joyful life must live a very holy life. This is the way to make the most of this love for yourself indeed.

Counsel 4. To this end you must take root and be grounded in love (Eph 3:17); that is, you must be well settled and established in this love, if you would indeed make the most of it. You must not be shaken as to its doctrine and grounds. You must be well acquainted with these, for he who is only a child in this doctrine is not yet capable of falling in with these exhortations. Such people waver and fear when tempted, and “he that feareth is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18); nor can he make the most of it for himself and his soul’s good as he should.

Counsel 5. Lastly, to this end keep those grounds and evidences that God has given you of your calling to be partakers of this love, with all clearness, upon your hearts and in your minds. For he who lacks a sight of them, or a proof that they are true and good, can take little comfort in this love. There is a great mystery in the way of God with his people. He will justify them without their works; he will pardon them for his Son’s sake. But those who are careless, carnal, and not holy in their lives shall have little comfort from what he has done, is doing, and will do for them. Nor shall they have their evidences for heaven at hand, or free of doubt. Yes, they shall walk without the sun, and get their comfort only in scraps and with knocks, while others sit at their Father’s table, have liberty to go into the wine cellar, rejoice in the sweet and pleasant face of their heavenly Father toward them, and know it will go well with them in the end.

Something should now be said, by way of conclusion, to the carnal world, who have heard me tell of all this love. But what shall I say to them? If I speak to them and they will not hear, or if I testify to them and they will not believe, or plead with them and they scorn me, it will all only aggravate and enlarge their sin, and tend to their further condemnation. And therefore I will leave the obstinate where I found him, and will say to him who is willing to be saved: Sinner, you have the advantage over your neighbor, not only because you are willing to live, but because there are those who are willing that you should, that is, those to whom escapes from death belong. And they are the Father and the Son, to whom be glory, with the blessed Spirit of grace, world without end. Amen.