volume 4

506 AN EXPOSITION OF THE [CHAP. V.
fear of it is included, on the account of the righteous authority of
God, as well as a faith of deliverance from it, on the account of his
omnipotent power.
1. The general causes of his state and condition, with his actings
therein, were included in that consideration and prospect which he
then had of God, death, and himself, or the effects of death upon
him.
(1.) He considered God at that instant as the supreme rector and
judge of all, the author of the law and the avenger of it, who had
power of life and death, as the one was to be destroyed and the other
inflicted, according to the curse and sentence of the law. Under
this notion he now considered God, and that as actually putting the
law in execution, having power and authority to give up unto the
himself unto him
sting of it, or to save from it. God represented
first as armed and attended with infinite holiness, righteousness, and
severity, as one that would not pass by sin nor acquit the guilty and
;
then as accompanied with supreme or sovereign authority over him,
the law, life, and death. And it is of great importance under what
notion we consider God when we "make our approaches unto him.
The whole frame of our souls, as to fear or confidence, will be regu
lated thereby.
(2.) He considered death not naturally, as a separation of soul and
such as was
body ; nor yet merely as a painful separation of them,
that death which in particular he was to undergo but he looked on
;
it as the curse of the law due to sin, inflicted by God as a just and
righteous judge. Hence, in and under it, he himself is said to be
"made a curse/ Gal. iii. 13. This curse was now coming on him,
as the sponsor or surety of the new covenant. For although he con
sidered himself, and the effects of things upon himself, yet he offered
up these prayers as our sponsor, that the work of mediation which
he had undertaken might have a good and blessed issue.
From hence may we take a view of that frame of soul which our
Lord Jesus Christ was in when he offered up prayers and supplica
tions, with strong cries and tears, considering God as him who had
authority over the law, and the sentence of it that was to be inflicted
on him. Some have thought, that upon the confidence of the in-
dissolubleness of his person, and the actual assurance which they
suppose he had always of the love of God, his sufferings could have
no effect of fear, sorrow, trouble, or perplexity on his soul, but only
what respected the natural enduring of pain and shame, which he
was exposed unto. But the Scripture gives us another account of
these things.
It informs us, that
amazed;" that
"
"
he began to be afraid, and sore
his soul was heavy, and sorrowful unto death;" that
he was "in an and afterwards cried agony," out, "My God, my God,
hast thou forsaken me?" under a sense of divine dereliction.
why