620 THE GLORY OF CHRIST AS GOD-MAN. the divine inhabitant, that is, God himself; so that neither the cloud, nor the bush, nor the fire, nor the man, or angel, are ever represented as God, or called Jehovah, without including the idea of that godhead that resided or inhabited in them. So when it is said, God is goneup with a shout ; Ps. xlvii. it Both not mean merely the ark which was carried up to Zion, but Gott dwelling on the ark or the mercy-seat. And in the same man- ner thegestures, motions and appearances are ascribed to God, which were visible in that body in which God at that time resided, and which he made the symbol of his presence ; but this body.is never called God when taken alone, without inclu- ding the present godhead or almighty Spirit residing there. 5. Hence it will follow, that the 'words God, Lord, Al- mighty, Jehovah, which are used in scripture on these occasions, arenot sunk into a figurative or diminutive sense on purpose to be applied metaphorically to a cloud, a fire, or an angel, as a resemblance or emblem of the true God, or as a symbol of his presence; but these divine names and titles are preserved in their original and most sublime and divine sense, and applied to God himself consideredin and together with these his habitations or placesof residence. 6. It is very probable that the great God never resided, if I may so speak, immediately in any corporeal habitationwithout the medium of an angelica or intellectual being by whom he spoke and acted, andby whom hemoved this corporeal habitation as he pleased. We have good reason to suppose that the angel of God's presence, the angel of the covenant, the angel in whom was the name of God, was still the more immediate shekinah or residence of God, whether he dwelt mediately in a cloud, or light, or fire, or a human shape. And on this account in the narration of the same transaction it is expressed sometimes that the angel of the Lord appeared, and sometimes the Lord God himself appeared, for instance, to Moses in the bush, to Abra- ham, &c. The naines God, or the Lord, or the angel, are A' Note, Though in several places I represent Christ inhis pre-existent state as an angel according to scripture, yet I always suppose this pre- existent soul of Christ to be a proper human spirit, that is, such a spirit as by its own nature is suited to act in vital union with a' human animal body. These things are proved at large in the last of these discourses. The reason why he is called an angel, is partly because he was then an unbodied spirit, 'and lived as angels do, not united to an animal body ; and partly because he was sent as the Father's messenger, which is the meaning of the word angel in the original languages, Greek and Hebrew. Note further, That thisdoes not at all hinder the human soul of Christ from having intellectual capacities and powers vastly superior to any other human soul, or to any angel in heaven, even as the capacities and intellectual,powers 9f one man are vastly superior to another, as the soul of Milton or Sir Isaac Newton to an idiot, and especially while we consider this human soul asconstantly inhabited by, and personally united to the eternal godhead, we bave abundant reason to suppose bis human faculties superior' to those of any other creature.
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