Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me. John xvii. 4, &c.

[As much as if he had said, I found them slaves and in bondage, in Satan's kingdom, sinning against thee with an high hand and out-stretched arm; but I have had pity upon them; I have redeemed them with my blood; I have paid the price which thy justice demanded; and now, O Father, I pray not for the world, but for these, whom I have redeemed; receive them, I beseech thee, into thy kingdom, that they may behold my glory; impute not their sin unto them, but unto me; impute my obedience unto them, view them through me, and let them stand acquitted in thy sight.] As it is written:

God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them. 2 Cor. v. 19.

David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works,

Saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.

Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Rom. iv. 6-8.

Nor he their outward only with the skins
Of beasts, but inward nakedness (much more
Opprobrious) with his robe of righteousness
Arraying, cover'd from his Father's sight.

The doctrine of imputation may be defined thus:

MILTON.

To impute, is to charge a thing upon a person, whether guilty or not, as the circumstances hereafter are proved or not. Thus, Shimei entreated David that he would not "impute iniquity to him" for some former transaction, 2 Sam. xix. 19. And the apostle Paul, Rom. iv, 8. declares them blessed "unto whom the Lord will not impute sin." This is the general sense of imputation. But in the case of the imputed righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ to his people, and their sins imputed to him, the sense of imputation goes further, and ascribes to Christ and to the sinner that which each Lath not, but by the very act of imputing it to them. Hence the

apostle Paul explains it in the clearest manner in two scriptures: the first is 2 Cor. v. 21. where, speaking of the imputation of our sins to Christ, and his righteousness to us, he refers it into the sovereignty and good pleasure of God the Father; for, speaking of Christ, it is said, "God hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." Here the doctrine of imputation is most plainly and fully stated. Christ is the imputed sinner, or rather, sin itself in the total abstract, and in the very moment when he knew no sin; and the sinner is said to be righteous, yea, the righteousness of God in Christ, when at the same time he hath not a single portion of righteousness in himself, or in any of his doings. This is, therefore, to impute Christ's righteousness to his people, and their sins to him. The other scripture that explains the doctrine is but in part, namely, respecting the imputation of sin. Gal. iii. 13. "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. Here Christ stands with all the curse of a broken law charged upon him, as the sinner's surety; yea, as the curse itself. And, consequently, as in the doing of this, he takes it from his people, they are redeemed from it. The original debtor, and the surety who pays for that debtor, cannot both have the debt at the same time charged home upon them. This, therefore, is the blessed doctrine of imputation: Our sins are imputed to Christ; his righteousness is imputed to us. And this by the authority and appointment of God; for without this authority and appointment of God, the transfer could not have taken place. For it would have been totally beyond our power to have made it; but, surely, not beyond the right and prerogative of God. And if God accepts such a ransom; (yca, he himself appoints it) and if the sinner by Christ's righteousness be made holy; and if the sins of the sinner be all done away by Christ's voluntary sufferings and death; if the law of God be thus honoured; his justice thus satisfied; all the divine perfections glorified by an equivalent, yea, more than an equivalent, inasmuch as Christ's obedience and death infinitely transcend in dignity and value the everlasting obedience of men and angels; surely, here is the fullest assurance of the truth of the doctrine of Christ's imputed righteous

tisfaction lies in the expiatory sacrifice offered by Christ upon the cross; hence expiation, or atonement, is joined with pardon in Scripture. The priest was to make atonement, that the sin might be forgiven. An expiatory sacrifice led the way to forgiveness under the law; and so it does now under the Gospel. Without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins. If you have not the blood of Christ in your eye, when you go to God for pardon,

never think to speed.

Elisha Cole.

Moses saw two Hebrews striving together, and endeavoured to set them at one again. Had he succeeded, he would have produced a one-ment; he would have made them at-one-ment: in plain English, he would have made them friends again. Now this was effected between a justly-offended God and sinful men by the death of Jesus Christ: and thus God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.

Robinson.

Sir, I obey your orders cheerfully; it is a favourite subject, and concerns me much. If Jesus Christ is not truly God, he cannot save me; no atonement can be made by his death. Neither need he come from heaven, merely as a prophet to instruct me. He might have taught me just the same things by the mouth of Paul or Peter, as by his own mouth; and they might have confirmed their truth by their death, as well as himself; but they could make no atonement on a cross for sin; none but a real God-man can do this.

Berridge.

The opinion, that the Deity might be appeased by expiatory sacrifices has been very widely diffused among the human race; and the attempt has generally been made by shedding the blood and burning a part of the body of some useful animal. This notion and practice seems very remote from the dictates of our natural reason: and it is extremely improbable that it should have been the result of man's invention. We may therefore most rationally conclude that it was purely the doctrine of revelation, and the ap pointment of God, handed down by tradition from the progenitors of our race, to the several branches of their posterity; and it is cer

tain that we meet with it in the Bible immediately after the entrance of sin, when Cain's oblation of the first fruits of the earth was rejected, and Abel's sacrifice of the firstlings of the flock was accepted: we may naturally conclude that the latter was presented according to divine appointment, and the former was not. But if we inquire into the reason of this appointment, the practice of the patriarchs, &c. and the multiplied precepts in the Mosaic law, as to this particular, we shall not easily arrive at any satisfactory solution, except we admit the doctrine of Christ's atonement, and suppose them to refer to him, as the substance of all these shadows.

The rules and general usages respecting the expiatory sacrifices under the Old Testament, may assist us in understanding the nature of our Lord's atonement, of which they were types and prefigurations. The offender, whose crimes might be thus expiated, was required, according to the nature of the case, to bring his offering of the flock or of the herd," to the door of the tabernacle." The very nature of the animals appointed for sacrifice was significant: not the ferocious, the noxious, the subtle, or the unclean; but such as were gentle, docile, and valuable; and none of these were to be offerred, but such as were " without blemish," or perfect in their kind. The offender was directed to bring an offering in which he had a property, to be presented unto God, and thus substituted in his stead, for this particular purpose. He was then " to lay his hands upon the head" of the sacrifice, which denoted the translation of guilt from him, by the imputation to the substituted animal. This is generally thought to have been attended by a confession of his sins, and prayers for pardon, through the acceptance of his oblation. And doubtless, it implied as much, and would be attended at least with secret devotions to that effect, by every pious Israelite Levit. i. 5.

The priests were next employed "to shed the blood of the sacrifice," which being the life of every animal, was reserved to make atonement, and was therefore not allowed to be eaten, under the Old. Testament dispensation, Lev. xvii. 11. Afterwards the body, or part of it, as the fat, &c. was burned upon the altar with the fire which came immediately from heaven, both at the opening of the taber

nacle worship, and afterwards at the consecration of Solomon's temple. Lev. ix. 24. 2 Chron. vii. 1-3. Now, who can help perceiving that this fire represented the avenging justice of God, (who is a consuming fire) and that when it consumed the harmless, unblemished sacrifice, while the guilty offerer escaped, is aptly prefigured the way of a sinner's salvation, through the expiatory sufferings of the spotless Lamb of God. The animal's violent death, by the shedding of its blood, denoted the offender's desert of temporal death; and the subsequent burning of its fat, or flesh, shewed him to be exposed to future vengeance; but then they represented the guilt and punishment, in both respects, as translated from him to the sacrifice, which bore them in his stead; and the whole ceremony, which concluded with the sprinkling of the blood, and in many cases its application to all those things that pertained to the worship of God, evidently typified the believer's deliverance from guilt and punishment, from the sting and dread of death, and finally from death itself; from sin and all its consequences; the acceptance of his person and services; and his participation of eternal life and felicity, through" Him who loved him, and washed him from his sius in his own blood."

Scott.

Throughout the Mosaic economy, the doctrine of an atonement was set forth in lively colours by the bleeding victims on the Jewish altar. Prophets spoke of it in the most unequivocal terms, and apostles asserted it as the fundamental article of Christianity: yea, the exclamation of John," Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," was but the echo of what patriarchs, priests, and prophets had proclaimed ages before.

A very distant view of the perfections of Deity, connected with a little acquaintance with human depravity, will constrain the man, whose eyes are not blinded by the god of this world, to receive the sentiment of the apostle, " that without shedding of blood there is no remission;" and this solemn truth admitted, will render the atonement of Christ an essential doctrine.

The victim which infinite wisdom appointed was no other than the co-equal Son of God; and because Deity could not suffer, a body was prepared for him, that perfect humanity might bleed in