Thomas Manton · 46 of 57

The Eleventh Verse. · Part 1

He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many for he shall bear their iniquities.

THE prophet goeth on in describing the glorious effects of the covenant of God with Jesus Christ, and his obedience and humiliation answerable thereunto. God the Father’s part was to bestow privileges, grace, and glory, and every good thing upon believers; and God the Son’s part was to obey, and suffer, and die, to submit himself to all kind of labour and travail of spirit for our sakes: for God being about to deal with us in mercy, would first deal with Christ in justice; and the state of the work of redemption was so laid, that, as Suarez proveth well, our grace and glory was due to Christ injustice, as the reward of his merit. Much was spoken before what God would do, and what Christ might expect in case he would lay down his soul as an offering for sin; he should ‘see his seed, prolong his days, and God’s pleasure should prosper in his hands.’ And the prophet here goeth on in repeating the same thing, only addeth words more particular and significant, that he might more fully and expressly draw out the sense and meaning of the former privileges to your apprehensions: ‘He shall see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied.’

In these words three things are asserted:—

1. Christ’s travail of soul in the work of our redemption.

2. The certainty of success: he shall see; that is, reap the wished and expected fruits of his labour and sorrows, which is the comfort and salvation of poor creatures.

3. His contentment therein: he shall be satisfied. He counts the salvation of lost sinners to be satisfaction enough for all his pains. You may take the words as relating to God’s decree, or to the execution of it.

[1.] As to God’s decree, the foregoing verse intimateth the compact and bargain between God the Father and the Son; there were articles of agreement stated between them. Now when Christ came to consider what he should give, and what he should gain, he professeth he is satisfied, and abundantly pleased with the terms propounded. Our Lord Jesus made no blind bargain. He knew from all eternity what it would cost him to save sinners; he had leisure enough to cast up his accounts. And when he foresaw the temptations of the wilderness, and the agonies of the garden, the ignominy of the cross, the vile usage of his body, and the travail of his soul, yet saith our dearest Redeemer, I will go down and suffer upon these terms; I am satisfied out of all this, if a few broken-hearted creatures may be brought home to God.

[2.] To the execution of God’s decree. When sinners are brought to accept of mercy, I count my blood well shed, my bitter agonies well recompensed: here is wages enough for all my toil. There is joy in heaven, in Christ’s heart, when a sinner is converted.

I begin with the first; the travail of his soul. The word for travail noteth the highest degree of labour, such as is tiring and wearisome. The soul is often put for the whole man; so many souls came out of Egypt, that is, so many persons. So Acts xxvii. 37, ‘There were in the ship two hundred threescore and six souls.’ So that the travail of his soul is his whole labour and travail. Or properly it may imply his soul-troubles, which were the passion of his passion, the bitterest part of his sufferings: ‘Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say?’ John xii. 27.

The doctrine is, that our salvation cost Christ much travail of soul. He was afflicted in his whole man, but chiefly in his inward man.

1. As a kind of imaginary person: he suffered in his reputation, which, is another kind of being in the hearts and opinions of others. They accuse him of the two highest crimes in either table, blasphemy and sedition; blasphemy against God, and sedition against Caesar, Luke xxiii. 2. They mock him in all his offices; his kingly office, by putting a soldier’s coat upon him for a royal robe, a reed for a sceptre, and thorns for a crown, and floutingly saying unto him, ‘Hail, King of the Jews,’ Mat. xxvii. 29. In his prophetical office; when they had blindfolded him, they smote him on the face, saying, ‘Prophesy who it was that smote thee;’ scoffing at those who honoured him as a prophet. When he was upon the cross, offering up himself for our sins, they wagged the head, saying, ‘Save thyself,’ and ‘He saved others, himself he cannot save.’ Mat. xxvii. 39, 42. There they scoff at his priestly office, while doing the part of a Saviour.

2. Nearer they come to his real person. In his body he suffered in every part, and afflictions were poured in upon him by the conduit of every sense. His feeling was exercised with weariness, and wounds, and scourges; his ears with their railing and the clamorous noises of popular outrage; his taste with vinegar and gall; his sight and smell with Golgotha, the place of skulls and dead men’s bones. We have made all our senses inlets of sin, and therefore in Christ they were inlets of sorrow.

But the consummation of his bodily sufferings was at his death, which consisted in the separation of the soul from the body, though both still remained united to the divine nature; otherwise for a while he would not be God-man, and his resurrection would be a new incarnation; though separate from one another, yet they were both united to the Godhead. As a man drawing his sword holdeth the sword in one hand, and the sheath in the other; there is a separation between the sword and the sheath, but the same man holdeth both. O Christians! do we believe this, and wonder no more that life itself should die, and Christ be free among the dead? If any had cause to love his life, Christ had; every man’s life is valuable, much more Christ’s, which was enriched with the continual presence of God. We are often a burden to ourselves; we wish for death; but that Christ should die, whose soul dwelt with God in a personal union, is a wonder.

His death was not a naked death, but the painful, shameful, and accursed death of the cross. The law pronounced the death of the cross accursed: Deut. xxi. 23, ‘He that is hanged is accursed of God.’ In the account of all nations it is ignominious. It was cruel and painful, to show that he came to bear not only our curse but our sorrows: Gal. iii. 13, He was ‘made a curse for us;’ Isa. liii. 4, ‘Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows.’ If you follow him to the grave, it was a continuation of his abasement, though not of his pain. Thither Christ went to shut and seal up our sins, that they should no more come into remembrance, as Abraham buried his dead out of his sight. If we look only to what was visible, Christ was a man of sorrows; his life was full of sorrows, his death violent, and bloody, and ignominious.

But all this doth not answer the expression, travail of soul. Our souls sinned, and therefore Christ must lay down his soul as an offering for sin, Isa. liii. 10. In Christ’s soul-sufferings we may take notice of two things—his desertion and agonies. These have some correspondence with the poena damni et sensus.

I. His desertion: Mat. xxvii. 46, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ Christ’s desertion cannot be meant of outward afflictions, of being left to the rage and violence of men. The word forsaking implieth God’s withdrawing: 2 Cor. iv. 9, ‘We are persecuted, but not forsaken;’ though given up to the will of men, yet still enjoying the presence of God: but Christ was both persecuted and forsaken.

But how could he be forsaken, who was God-man in the same person?

Ans. As the personal union gave way to the death of the body, so it gave way to the troubles of the soul. Christ, by virtue of the eternal covenant, was to yield up the whole human nature, both body and soul, to suffer according to the will of God. Now, he declined no part of the service; as he offered his body to the pains of death, so his soul to the trouble of desertion.

But what was this desertion?

[1.] The personal union was not dissolved—the two natures united, ἀχωρίστως,—his inherent holiness not lessened, for then he should have been less fit to be either priest or sacrifice. God’s love to him was not abated; he was now doing his work, and in the height of obedience: John x. 17, ‘Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life.’ This was a new argument and reason of love.

[2.] Assisting and sustaining grace was not wholly withdrawn: Isa. xlii. 1, ‘Behold my servant, whom I uphold;’ and John xvi. 32, ‘I am not alone, because the Father is ever with me.’ What was that, then, which Christ lost? It was the sense and actual comfort of his Father’s love, the want of a sensible consolation, those effects of joy and solace which he used to have.. Now, this was a very grievous loss to Christ. He complaineth of it. The disciples were fled, his friend and lover was afar off, but he doth not complain of that: Disciples, why have ye forsaken me? Peter, why hast thou denied me?—but, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ It was a greater loss to Christ, because it was more natural to him to enjoy this comfort and solace than it can be to any creature. To have a candle put out, is no great matter; but to have the sun eclipsed, who is the fountain of light, that sets the world a-wondering. Christ, as God-man, had more to lose. We lose drops; he an ocean. The greater the enjoyment, the loss or want of it is the greater.

[3.] He knew how to value the comfort of the union, having a pure understanding, heavenly affections, excellent contemplations. God’s children, that have tasted of his love, if anything of it be shed abroad in their hearts, they would not part with it to gain the world. They know how to value it, and so none are so sensible of the loss of it as they. Now, Christ was best able to apprehend the worth of communion with God, having such a clear understanding, and such tender affections.

[4.] So near an interest and relation to God: Prov. viii. 30, ‘I was by him as one brought up with him; I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him;’ Col. i. 13, he is called ‘his dear Son.’ Creatures that have any interest in God, how mournfully do they brook his absence! As Mary Magdalene: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him.’ She sought for Christ, and found a grave.

[5.] Christ’s trouble was more than a believer’s, because it was to be satisfactory. Our desertions are for trial or correction; his from vindictive justice, and the revenging hand of God for our sins, that met on him: Isa. liii. 6, ‘The Lord laid on him the iniquities of us all.’ He was forsaken for a time, that we might be received for ever.

2. There is something positive, or the apprehension of his Father’s wrath, which he was to undergo for man’s sins. There is the trouble of a guilty conscience, that is proper to the sinner himself; and there is a penal disturbance, which was found in our surety. He was to stand in the sinner’s stead, and the great burden of sin he was to undergo was an amazement to him that had such a delicate and tender spirit as Christ had: Mat. xxvi. 38, ‘My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.’ He was ‘sore amazed,’ Mark xiv. 33. He had his ‘fears.’ Heb. v. 7. The effects were sensible in his bloody sweat. These were a part of that fire in which our sacrifice was to be roasted. It was not the fear of temporal death that caused these agonies. Christ had not a childish, womanish spirit; not to say anything of the fortitude of the martyrs, many of whom kissed the stake, and thanked the executioner. And we see in malefactors what a courage and stubbornness men of a stout heart will put on. No; it was the apprehension of his Father’s wrath, which he was to undergo for man’s sin, when ‘made a curse for us,’ Gal. iii. 13. We have slight thoughts of sin, and the wrath of God deserved thereby; but Christ had other thoughts of it. When God cometh to deal with him in our stead, we, that know not the power of God’s anger, are not affected with it. But when the Father shall fall upon him with all his weight, this was properly the travail of his soul: Isa. liii. 10, ‘It pleased the Father to bruise him: he hath put him to grief.’

Hence learn:—

1. The heinousness of sin. You see it is no easy matter to reconcile sinners to God. It cost Christ a life of sorrows, and afterwards a painful, shameful, and an accursed death; the loss of actual comfort, and a terrible feeling, or an amazing sense of the wrath of God. We jest and sport away our souls, but Christ found it hard work to save them, and recover them to God. Surely they that sin freely in thought, and foully in act, have low thoughts of the blood of Christ. You count it common blood: Heb. x. 29, ‘And have counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing.’ When you make it a light thing to sin, you do in effect say so. When a precious vessel cannot be mended or repaired but with the cost of a thousand pounds, you would be careful how you break it. You slight the sufferings of Christ when you break with God for every trifle. Is it nothing for the Son of God to come down from heaven to die for poor sinners? He calleth to you, ‘Behold, all ye that pass by, is any sorrow like unto my sorrow?’ Is it nothing to offend your heavenly Father, and to lie under the burden of his displeasure? By his dealing with his dear Son, substituted into the room and place of sinners, God would convince all wicked and hard-hearted sinners what it is to break his commandments. Dare you, after all this, to go on pleasingly and delightfully in an evil course, as if God made a small matter of our sins? Now he is satisfied for them by a Mediator.

2. Learn hence the terribleness of God’s wrath. It put Jesus Christ upon dying, yea, upon much travail of soul. Christ knew before all that he was to suffer, and yet he is amazed when it came upon him. Many roar upon their death-beds when the anger of the Lord breaketh in upon them like an armed man. They never thought of their danger before, and were not prepared for it; but Christ knew it before. Besides, Christ had no personal guilt to weaken his strength; you have wounded consciences. Christ had all graces in him to the height; but you have none or little patience and fortitude. Christ was God-man, you are poor creatures. Christ knew what glory his sufferings would bring to God, what good to man; and yet he feareth what he was to undergo; and Christ knew they would be short, yet he prayeth, ‘Father, save me from this hour:’ but yours are to endure for ever. The Lord Jesus is lifted up as a sign of salvation to them that trust in him, and is a pledge of what shall light upon the wicked to all eternity—an instance to all others of’ God’s wrath. God will make you see what it is to lie under his wrath. If a spark of it light upon the conscience, what a burden is a man to himself!

3. We learn hence the greatness of our obligations to Christ, that he willingly condescended to endure such hard and bitter things for our sakes. He would be deserted and submit to soul-troubles; he knew well enough what it would cost him, yet he willingly undertook the business: Ps. xl. 7, 8. ‘Then said I, Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God; thy law is within my heart.’ Divine justice is there introduced proposing its demands: Son, you must take a body and suffer in it. Man’s blood is tainted, and you must be formed in fashion like one of them, and stand before me in their stead. You must expect to be tempted by the devil, hunted and baited by men,—to be responsible to my justice, to bear my wrath, and to be handled as if you were the sinner in law. And Christ said, Heb. x. 7, ‘Lo, I come to do thy will, O God;’ I am satisfied and well pleased with the terms. Oh! woe unto us, if after all this we should slight Christ, and will not come at him, though it cost us travail of soul. To pray, wait, meditate, is tedious, and to break our hard hearts we are hardly brought to; yet how willingly and readily did Christ undergo all his sufferings for our sakes!

4. We learn hence what reason we have to be willing to suffer any thing for Christ, and to yield obedience to God at the dearest rate. We are called upon in the gospel to take up our cross and follow Christ, and when he invited us first to engage with him, he gave us warning of it; yet most men hope to shift well enough for all this, and are not troubled, and out of the impatiency of the flesh repine when it cometh really and actually to their share to take it up and bear it. Certainly, in the general, we should not desire a better lot than Christ himself had; for the disciple is not above his Lord: ‘If they have persecuted me, they will persecute you also,’ John xv. 20. He stooped to more than ever we were or shall be put to. But, in particular, we should be as willing to suffer for his sake as he for ours. He left the bosom of his Father to suffer for you, and will not you leave the bosom of your dearest relations to surfer for Christ? There is a great disproportion between the persons, and his sufferings and ours. Christ suffered as an evil-doer, and we surfer for well-doing; otherwise, it is the cross of Barabbas, not of Christ. His name was rent and torn with reproaches; and though he never did anything worthy of blame, yet he bore the taunts of the world, as well as the curse of God that was due for our sins, and suffered not only in his person, but in his name and reputation, and foul crimes were unjustly laid to his charge. It is an honour to suffer for Christ, and for his interest, and can be no disgraceful thing. He was the innocent Son of God, completely just and righteous—not only as God, but as man, being wholly freed of that original contagion wherewith others that come of Adam are defiled, Luke i. 35; fully conform to the law of God, both in heart and practice, Mat. iii. 15; and by just deserving lovely in the eyes of God and men, for he did all things well. But we, how innocent soever of those things which the world chargeth upon us, yet we are faulty before God, and cannot altogether justify ourselves before men. And so far as God’s hand is in our troubles, we must keep silence. Therefore, in the sense of our sinfulness in other things, we should the sooner submit: Micah vii. 3, ‘I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him.’ Again, he hath taken the sting out of our sufferings, and borne all the wrath due for our sins. Our crosses are not a satisfaction to his vindictive justice; he is but trying our sincerity, not pursuing his vengeance upon us. And we have our comforts allowed us; his were suspended. In short, since he endured the anger and wrath of God for us, shall not we endure the anger and wrath of men for his sake? So that, upon the whole matter, our murmuring and impatience under the cross show that we have not a due sense of Christ’s sufferings, but too slight a value of them.

The next thing offered in this scripture is the certainty of success. He shall see; that is, enjoy, receive the fruits of it. The prophet speaketh of some that travail in vain; as if they went but with the wind: Isa. xxvi. 18, ‘We have been with child, we have been in pain, we have as it were brought forth wind.’ And of others we read, that when the child came near to the birth, there was not strength to bring forth, Isa. xxxvii. 3. But the fruits of this travail should be a plentiful harvest of souls, or a numerous issue of believers begotten unto God.

Doct. That Christ will infallibly, and without miscarrying, obtain the end of his death.

What was the end of his death?

1. The salvation of all such as belong to the election of grace. Christ died not at uncertainties, nor laid down his life at a venture, that some might be saved if they would; but his intention is fixed. He laid down his life ‘for his sheep,’ John x. 17; ‘for his church.’ Eph. v. 26; ‘for his people.’ Mat. i. 21. These expressions are exclusive; these, and not all.

2. He effects and procures the conditions by which this salvation is brought about:—

[1.] In effectual calling.

[2.J By final perseverance.

[1.] Effectual calling. Christ died not only to procure privileges for us, but to purchase faith and repentance: Acts v. 31, ‘Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be a prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins;’ Heb. xii. 2, ‘Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God;’ and Heb. xiii. 21, ‘Working in you what is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ;’ Phil. i. 29, ‘For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake,’ ὑπερ Χρίστου, that is, upon Christ’s account. He merited faith and holiness for us.

[2.] Final perseverance. He is both the author and finisher of our faith: John x. 29, ‘My Father, who gave them me, is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand;’ Heb. x. 14, ‘For by one offering he perfected for ever them that are sanctified,’ i.e., set apart for God. He hath made them fully and perfectly happy.

But briefly to show why Christ cannot miscarry in his ends from the eternal covenant: Isa. liii. 10, ‘When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed.’ Look to the undertaking of the Father and the Son, and the salvation of the elect is secured; both are intimated in that phrase of being given to Christ: John xvii. 6, ‘Thine they were, and thou gavest them me.’ All souls were God’s in one sense; now they are given to Christ two ways:—

1. By way of reward: Ps. ii. 8, ‘Ask of me, and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.’

2. By way of charge; and of this charge Christ is to give an account: John vi. 37, 38, ‘All that the Father giveth me shall come unto me; and him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out: for I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.’ And they not only may, but they shall come: John vi. 39, ‘And this is the Father’s will, who hath sent me, that of all that he hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.’ Otherwise Christ would lose part of his reward and part of his charge: Heb. ii. 13, ‘Behold I and the children whom thou hast given me.’

Use. Is to persuade us to wait for this power, and observe how the whole good pleasure of his will is fulfilled in us. Doth your salvation thrive and prosper in the hands of Christ? Do you come on kindly in a way of faith? You seek to put your Redeemer to shame,—to hinder Jesus Christ of the fruit of his travail, when you are vain, and careless, and obstinate. As a moral agent, so all his travail may be in vain, though not as Mediator. He complaineth as a minister of the circumcision: Isa. xlix. 4, ‘Then I said, I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought and in vain; yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God.’ When a people that have the means of grace will not be reclaimed, they seek to rob Christ of his purchase, and to make all his labour of love to be in vain. Christians are co-workers with God: ‘We therefore, as workers together with him, beseech you to receive not this grace in vain,’ 2 Cor. vi. 1. Oh, when shall Christ be formed in you? There is travailing in pain till that be done, Gal. iv. 19. Will you be shut out from the blessing?

Use 2. Here is comfort to God’s elect, and an engagement to make your election sure. How shall we know it? Do you ratify God’s decree by your consent? Consecration answereth giving by way of reward, and committing by way of charge.

1. Consecrate and set apart yourselves for the use and service of the Lord: Rom. xii. 1, ‘I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.’ Employ what ever is bestowed upon you for his glory; live according to his will: Ps. cxix. 94, ‘I am thine, save me.’ Lord, I would not be my own, unless I be thine. Thus we should do when God seemeth to put us off.

2. Commit yourselves to him in well-doing, and in the course of your obedience venture your souls in Christ’s hands without trouble: 2 Tim. i. 12, ‘For I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day;’ 1 Peter iv. 19, ‘Commit the keeping of your souls to him in well-doing, as unto a faithful Creator;’ Ps. xxxi. 5, ‘Into thy hands I commit my spirit, for thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth.’

I come to the third thing in this scripture, and that is the satisfaction Christ took in the salvation of men; it was that which gave him full content for all his pains and travail: ‘He shall see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied.’ The gaining and recovering of lost sinners was a great satisfaction to Jesus Christ: John iv. 34, Christ saith unto them, ‘My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.’ When the disciples asked him whether he had eaten anything, it was satisfaction enough to him that he had gained a soul. See Luke xv. 5, ‘And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing.’ He rejoiceth at the return of a poor wandering sinner; after all the refusals of grace, and despising of offers, Christ is glad if he may at length get him home to himself. It is a welcome work to Christ to carry home his lost sheep upon his shoulders.

Doct. That Jesus Christ taketh an infinite contentment and satisfaction in the salvation of sinners.

I shall give you—(1.) Evidences of it; (2.) The reasons of it.

1. For the evidences:—

[1.] Christ pleased and entertained himself in the thought of it before the world was: Prov. viii. 31, ‘Rejoicing in the habitable parts of the earth, and my delights were with the sons of men.’ But why the habitable parts? The inhabitable are also the work of God’s hands. There are objects of wonder—there is the great leviathan, and there is the sun, moon, and stars; but no men there with whom he was to dwell, or whom he was to save. Next to the complacency he took in God the Father, this was the delight of Christ, that he should come into the world and recover a people to himself.

[2.] This was the end and aim of his coming into the world; and it is pleasant when a man hath attained his end, especially if it be greatly desired and much laboured for. For delight is according to the degree of the desire and labour.