THE drift of the apostle in this chapter is to show that free justification by faith in Christ greatly tendeth to promote holiness; which he first proveth from the tenor of Christianity, and then exhorteth the justified to get, increase, and exercise this holiness in all their actions. In these words there are three things -
1. An objection supposed.
2. A rejection of it with abhorrence and indignation.
3. A confutation of it.
1. The objection is a preposterous inference from what the apostle had said, chap. 5:20, 'That where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.' The apostle propoundeth it by way of interrogation, 'What shall we say then? shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?' The words may be conceived as a slander raised by Jewish prejudice to make the doctrine of the gospel odious, as if it did foster people in sin - an unjust calumny; or as a temptation incident to loose, carnal, and careless Christians, who are apt to abuse grace, and have such wretched reasonings in their own hearts, that they might take the more liberty to sin, that the grace of God might thereby appear more illustrious and abundant. You may therefore look upon it as produced either as a check to an objection already made, or as a prevention of an abuse that might afterwards be made.
2. He rejecteth this inference as absurd and blasphemous, by a form of speech familiar to him, Gal. 2:17, Rom. 3:6, 31, mè genoito; let this thought be far from us, or, this is a thing that all Christian hearts should abominate.
3. Paul's reason against it, or confutation of it, represented in an emphatical interrogation, 'How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?' Where observe -
[1.] That to continue in sin, and live longer in sin, are equivalent expressions; for in the objection the expression is, 'Shall we continue in sin?' But in the apostle's answer and argument to the contrary, it is, ‘Can we live any longer therein?'
[2.] Observe that before grace we lived in sin; for when he saith, ‘any longer,' he implieth that we were given to sin, enslaved by sin before; but shall we continue this course? Far be it from us to think so, or say so, much more to do so.
[3.] Observe the argument lieth here, 'We that are dead,’ &c. All that have given their names to Christ are, or should be, dead to sin. Now, to be dead to sin and live in sin are asustata, things incompatible; the dead are no longer alive.
Because this is the strength of his argument, it will be good to inquire what it is to be dead in sin. In the strict and rigorous notion, he is said to be dead who is utterly deprived of all sense and motion, that they are altogether without all feeling and motion of sin; but this strict sense will not stand here; therefore I must tell you the word relateth to the baptismal engagement, as the following verses abundantly do declare: - ver. 3, 'Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into his death?' Baptism referreth to Christ's death, and we are baptized into the likeness and power of his death; the meaning of that ordinance is to signify our dying to sin and rising to newness of life; this is that which every Christian knoweth, if he be but a little instructed in the principles of his religion. Well, then, every good Christian is dead to sin by vow and obligation, therefore cannot, should not, live any longer therein. There is a double undertaking in baptism - one on God's part, the other on ours; the undertaking on God's part is to give us the sanctifying Spirit of grace, to quell the reign of sin; the undertaking on our part is by the Spirit to mortify the deeds of the body. Now some make conscience of this solemn vow and promise, others do not; the apostle considereth not what is done, but what ought to be done; he speaketh de jure, of the vow and obligation - we are all bound; not de facto, of the event, not what always cometh to pass. All Christians are bound to be dead to sin, and every good Christian is actually dead to sin, which, though it hath some life and being left, yet it retaineth not its sovereignty and dominion over him. Some conceive this latter sort intended; hoitines apethanomen tèi hamartiai, as many of us as have died to sin: but rather he considereth the right than the fact. Christianity doth oblige all at their first entrance into the profession of it to renounce the reign and dominion of sin, and break the power of it yet more and more, so that it dieth, though a lingering death, as Christ did upon the cross.
Doct. That to take occasion to live in sin from free grace, or God's mercy to sinners in Christ, is an inference most unjust, absurd, and blasphemous, and that which all Christians' hearts should abominate.
Here in the text such an inference is mentioned with a denial joined with a detestation of the thing denied; the very thought and first mention of it ought to be entertained with abhorrency.
1. I will prove that the corrupt heart of man is apt to draw such consequence.
2. I will prove the three charges –
[1.] That it is very unjust and ill grounded.
[2.] Absurd and contradictory to Christianity.
[3.] Wicked and blasphemous.
First, That the corrupt heart of man is apt to draw such inferences from the doctrine of grace. In the general, carnal men are ill skilled at reasoning about spiritual matters. Solomon telleth us, Prov. 26:9, 'That a parable in a fool's mouth is like a thorn in the hand of a drunkard.' As a drunkard with a sharp thorn grievously hurts himself and others, neither his mind nor hand can do their office when the man is distempered with drink; so it is with men intoxicated by sin; witness those contrary and different conclusions, which the carnal and spiritual will draw from the same principles. From the stated course of nature the scoffer said, 2 Peter 3:4, 'Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.' David reasoneth the quite contrary way: Ps. 119: 89-91, 'for ever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth. They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants.' So 1 Cor. 15: 32, 'If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me if the dead rise not? Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we shall die;' with 1 Cor. 7:29,30, 'But this I say, brethren, the time is short: it remains that both they that have wives be as though they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not' So 2 Sam. 7:2, 'The king said unto Nathan the prophet, See now, I dwell in an house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains;' with Haggai 1:2, 'This people say, The time is not come, the time that the Lord's house should be built' So 2 Kings 6:33, 'Behold this evil is of the Lord, what should I wait for the Lord any longer?' with 1 Sam. 3:18, 'It is the Lord, let him do what seemeth him good.' So Mary Magdalene, upon Christ's pardoning her sin, was more abundant in duty and mourning for sin: Luke 7:47, 'Her sins, which were many, are forgiven; for she loved much;' and in the text, the directly contrary conclusion is drawn; 'sin, because grace doth abound;' make work for pardoning mercy. But particularly, it is very natural to us to abuse the gospel, and plead God's grace to quiet and strengthen ourselves in security and sin; the thoughts of men do easily incline them to such conclusions. That which hath been may be; that this hath been appeareth by the writings of the apostles, who everywhere seek to obviate this abuse; and also by evident reason.
1. We all affect liberty to a degree of licentiousness. This is natural to us, as appeareth by our distaste of Christ's strict laws: Ps. 2:3, 'Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us;' and our ready hearkening to seducers, 'who promise liberty, though they bring us into bondage to sin,' 2 Peter 2:19, and we be the more enslaved to baseness and filthiness.
2. The flesh taketh all occasions to indulge itself, and that it may be done in a plausible cleanly manner, and with less remorse from conscience, it catcheth at every pretence to countenance it. Sometimes it makes use of bodily austerities as a compensation for their sins; and so hypocrisy, superstition, and profaneness grow on the same root. The sensual nature of men is such that it is loath to be crossed, which produceth profaneness; for therefore do men indulge themselves in all manner of sensuality, because they are loath to deny their natural appetites and desires, and row against the stream of flesh and blood; but if nature must be crossed, or else they cannot palliate their carnal indulgences, then they will not mortify the lust, but afflict the body for a while, and in some slight manner, which produceth hypocrisy, and we excuse the partiality of our obedience by some outward shows of strictness; as Isa. 58: 5, 'They afflict the soul for a day, or bow down the head like a bulrush;' and so in the external actions of other duties. That this deceit may be more strong, they exceed in outward observances, and that produceth superstition, or some byelaws of our own, by which we hope to expiate our sins; as to whip and gash ourselves: Micah 6:6, 7, 'Wherewithal shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God? shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves of a year old? will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?' On the other side, if men's temper, education, and strain of religion carry them to another way, and they are all for the grace of the gospel, without the rudiments of men, the devil knows now to charm and lull souls asleep in sin by that way of profession also; and so many take liberty to sin under the pretence that God may have more occasion to exercise his mercy; and our proneness to please the flesh is countenanced by presumptions of grace, and the supposition of unreasonable indulgences of God to the faulty creature: Ps. 50: 21, 'These things hast thou done, and I kept silent; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself.' God will not be so severe as is commonly imagined; and so lessening God's holiness, they abate their reverence of him: Ps. 68: 19-21, 'Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation, Selah. He that is our God is the God of salvation, and unto God the Lord belong the issues from death. But God shall wound the head of his enemies, and the hairy scalp of such an one as goeth on still in his trespasses.' He seeketh to obviate their conceit, how great soever the riches of his bounty and grace offered in Christ be, yet he is irreconcileable to those that cease not to follow a course of sin.
3. This conceit is strengthened in us, because many that profess Christianity live licentiously. All sins propagate their kind, and among others, abuse of grace. We see others have great hopes and confidence in Christ, notwithstanding their carnal and worldly course of living, and self-love prompteth us that we may hope to fare as well as they; and so we leaven one another with a dead, loose, carnal sort of Christianity, instead of 'provoking each other to love and good works,’ Heb. 10: 24. Self-love is very partial, and loath to think evil of our condition. Now this cannot be justified by the laws of Christianity, yet it is often justified by the lives of Christians: after this rule they live in the world, and we think we may do as others do.
4. There is another cause, that is, Satan, who abuseth the weakness of some teachers, and the ignorance of some hearers, to misapply the grace of the gospel and the comforts of justification, to countenance their sins. The devil knoweth we will not receive his doctrine in his own name, and therefore doth what he can to usurp the name of Christ, and to obtrude his commands upon us in the name of Christ, and so conveyeth poison to you by the perfume of the gospel; and if he can set Christ against Christ, his merits and mercy against his government and Spirit, his promises against his laws, justification against sanctification, he knoweth that he obtaineth his end and purpose, that the gospel, which was set up to destroy the works of the devil, will be a means to cherish his kingdom in the world. And on the hearers' part, he abuseth them also; carnal hearts turn all into fuel for their lusts, and with the more pretence if they can allege a dispensation from God himself to serve and please the flesh, and no harm shall come of it. A little trusting in Christ shall serve the turn, though they live never so impure lives. I ascribe all this to Satan, because all error is from him, who is the father of lies, who often obtrudeth upon the simple credulity of Christians his own gospel instead of Christ's, and by a partial representation of Christ's gospel destroyeth the whole.
Secondly, I come now to make good the charge.
First, That this inference is very unjust and ill-grounded. The pretence here are those words of the apostle in the two last verses of the former chapter: 'Moreover the law entered that the offence might abound; but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound, that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life, by Jesus Christ our Lord.' These words yield no such consequence. To evince which - (1.) I shall state the meaning of those words; (2.) Show the unjustness of this illation from them.
1. For the meaning, the apostle showeth the law was given to the Israelites by Moses, not that they might be justified thereby, but that sin and punishment, to which we are liable by reason of sin, might the better be known; and so the grace of God in Christ, which justifieth us, notwithstanding the grievousness of sin, might be the more esteemed, and we might the more earnestly fly to it for sanctuary and refuge, and the curse might drive us to the promise. For there are two things which the law discovereth -
[1.] The multitude and heinous nature of our offences: 'It entered that sin might abound;' not in our practice, but in our sense and feeling, as being more apparent, and awakening more lively stings in our consciences. If a rugged and obstinate people sin the more, that is not the fault of the law, but of our corrupt nature, which always tendeth to that which is forbidden: 'It only took occasion from the commandment,' Rom. 7:8. The proper effect of the law was to give us more convincing and clear knowledge of duty and sin, or to be a means to aggravate sin, to render it more exceedingly heinous, as being against an express law of God's own giving, with great majesty and terror.
[2.] The other use of the law is to give us an awakening sense of the punishment due to sin, as it exposes us to temporal and eternal death, ver. 21; and so our deliverance and life by Christ might be more thankfully accepted, who by his mercy hath taken away the condemning and reigning power of sin, by granting pardon of it, and power over it; so that as a great and mortal disease maketh a physician famous if he cureth it, so sin maketh the grace of Christ more conspicuous and glorious.
2. The injustice of the illation.
[1.] There is a difference between causa per se, and causa per accidens, a cause and an occasion. Though the abounding of sin helpeth to advance grace, it is not of itself, but by accident, by God's overruling grace; therefore it is a desperate adventure to try conclusions, to drink rank poison to experiment the goodness of an antidote, or to wound ourselves mortally to try the virtue of a plaster. God made advantage of the sins of the world for the honouring of his grace in Christ; but they that presume to sin greatly, that God may pardon greatly, run a desperate adventure, whether God will pardon them or no.
[2.] There is a difference between the remission of sins past, and allowance of sin future. Our fixed purpose must be not to sin, but if we sin, we have the use of God's remedy: 1 John 2:1, 'My little children, these things I write unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.' If God made advantage of sins past to honour his grace, we also by sins past may make an advantage for a renewed use of faith in our Redeemer, and renewed desires and expectations of pardon by his intercession; but it is a wrong conclusion to think we may heap up new sins for time to come, and still make more work for pardoning mercy, and be content to offend God again, that he may still be pardoning, and we never forsake sin. In short, we must not sin that grace may abound; but when we have sinned, we must make use of abounding grace. Faith and repentance may draw good out of sin itself, to make the remembrance of it a means of our hatred and mortification of sin, and of more gratitude to our Redeemer; but not to take liberty to indulge sin, antedating our pardon before the fact
[3.] It is contrary to all ingenuity, and love to God or Christ. This is the difference between faith and presumption, or a sound and a blind confidence of pardon by Christ, namely, that faith maketh us hate sin, and presumption maketh us secure and bold in sinning, and slightly to pass it over with little remorse and reluctancy when we are guilty of it. He who presumeth doth the work of an age in a breath. God is merciful, Christ died for sinners, and all our confidence must be in Christ. But the true believer is more affected with sin; as 'she wept much and loved much to whom much was forgiven,' Luke 7:47; and Ezek. 16: 63, 'That thou mayest remember, and be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more because of thy shame, when I am pacified towards thee, for all that thou hast done.' They express their gratitude for remission of sin by a careful keeping from it. Pardoning mercy maketh God amiable to us, and his laws acceptable, our duty sweeter, and sin more grievous.
Secondly, It is absurd and contrary to the doctrine of grace: true Christianity is of a far different make from this conceit.
1. It is not consistent with the grace that goeth along with pardon, for God sanctifieth all those whom he justifieth: we receive, together with the remission of sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost: 1 Cor. 1:30, ‘Of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption;' 1 Cor. 6:11, ‘But ye are washed, but ye are justified, but ye are sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.' These are inseparable, the application of the merit of Christ and the gift of his Spirit, which reneweth us to the image of God, and mortifieth the life of sin in us; the heart broken with compunction seeketh this double benefit: 1 John 1:9, 'If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness;' as a malefactor that hath a leprosy on him needs not only a pardon, but a medicine; and in a broken leg not only ease of the pain is desirable, but that the bone be set right. Therefore we are both justified and sanctified; continuing in sin cannot consist with the truth of regeneration.
2. It is contrary to the order of God's grace in the new covenant, who requireth of us faith and repentance if we would be partakers of Christ. Now, to continue in sin is to be under the bondage of it, without restraint or any change of heart and life.
[1.] It is against faith. Take it for assent, it is a belief that he will save all those that submit to be sanctified and ruled by him in order to their salvation: Heb. 5:9, 'Being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey him.' If you hope to be saved by him, and will not be ruled by him, you do not believe Christ, but the devil; for if you believe Christ, you must believe that you cannot be saved unless you be converted: Mat. 18: 3, 'Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.' Take faith for acceptance of Christ, it is a hearty consent both of subjection to him and dependence upon him as the saviour and redeemer of the world. The mediator's blessing is 'to turn every one of you away from your iniquities,’ Acts 3:26; ‘he is a saviour' to save his people from their sins, Mat 1:21; to say nothing of 'receiving Christ the Lord,’ which the scripture presseth, Col. 2:6.
[2.] It is against repentance, which implieth a sorrow for sin, with a serious purpose to forsake it.
(1.) There is in it godly sorrow, 2 Cor. 7:10. This is requisite to check the sensual inclination, or love of pleasure, which is the heart, root, and life of all sin: it dies when our affection to it dies. In repentance with bitterness of soul we bemoan ourselves for offending God; now if we lick up our vomit again, and go round in a track of confessing sin and committing sin, our hearts are not sound with God; we undo that which is done, and so 'build again the things we have destroyed, if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we are still found sinners,’ Gal. 2:17,18. A man that truly seeks after pardon, seeks with it the ruin and destruction of sin. Sin was his greatest trouble, the burden that lay upon his conscience, the grievance from which he sought ease, the wound which pained him at heart, the disease that his soul was sick of. Is all this real? What will you say if this man should delight in his former trouble, and take up his burden that he groaned under, and prefer it before liberty, to tear open the wounds which were in a fair way of healing, willingly relapse into the sickness out of which he is recovered with so much ado? if he should desire the bonds and chains again, of which he was freed by infinite mercy? Surely then you may question the reality of all that he hath done. In the anguish of our souls we groaned under sin as the heaviest and most intolerable burden we could ever feel. Now, should we stoop to it, and take it on again, after it was lifted from our backs, who would pity us?
(2.) There is a renouncing and forsaking of sin: it is called 'Repentance from dead works,’ Heb. 6:1; not only repentance for but from them. The heart is so turned from sin, that it is turned against it: we do not repent of the sins we still live in. Now, if grace be dispensed in this order, what more contrary to the tenor of the gospel covenant?
(3.) This faith and repentance are solemnly professed in baptism, which is the initiating ordinance, wherein we profess to be baptized into the death of Christ, that is to say, to express the virtue, to be conformed to the likeness of it, and die unto sin. When we first gave our names to Christ, our baptism strictly obligeth us to continue no longer in sin; it is a vowed death to sin; therefore, if we continue in it, we renounce or forget our baptism, 2 Peter 1:9; if we wallow again in the mire after we are once washed, all that is done in baptism is but a nullity or empty formality. That is the apostle's argument here, 'How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?' There you solemnly renounced sin, that you might have no more commerce with it than the dead have with the living; therefore, for us to continue in sin, and indulge sin, is to break our solemn covenant with God. You have promised to give neither mind, nor heart, nor sense, nor any faculty or member of soul or body to accomplish it, but so carry yourselves as if you were dead. And besides, you deprive yourselves of the grace of the covenant which you might have. If you did not ponere obicem, you might be delivered from the reigning power of indwelling sin; therefore you must carefully see that it have not the upper hand in your souls, that the flesh be made subject to the spirit, that the reign and dominion of sin be indeed broken, that you run into no wilful sin, and walk with all holy strictness and watchfulness.
(4.) It is contrary to God's design to call us out of our sinful estate to sincere reformation. This was God's end, that we that fly from him as a condemning God might return to his love and service as a pardoning God: Ps. 130: 4, 'There is forgiveness with thee, that thou mightest be feared.' He pardoneth what is past upon condition of future obedience; he calleth us to repentance: Acts 17: 30, 'Now he commandeth all men everywhere to repent;' not to encourage them to continue, or go on a minute longer in a course of sin, or flatter them with hope of impunity if they do so: Ezek. 18: 30, 'Repent, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions, so iniquity shall not be your ruin;' Isa. 55:7, 'Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.'
Thirdly, It is wicked and blasphemous.
1. Because, as much as in you lieth, you make Christ a minister of sin, or an encourager of sin: Gal 2:7, 'If while we seek to be justified by Christ, we are found sinners, is Christ a minister of sin? God forbid.'
2. They prevent the highest institution in the world for the recovery of men to God: Jude 4, metatithentes, 'turning the grace of God into wantonness.' The gospel is the only way of taking away sin; you make it the only way to countenance sin. Grace is there taken for objective grace, viz., grace held forth to us in the doctrine of the gospel. The doctrine of the gospel doth not tend to make men sinners, nor encourage them to lay aside all care of holiness or good works.
Use 1: Caution against this abuse.
1. Be not prejudiced against the doctrine of grace, as if it yielded these conclusions. It is a misunderstood and misapplied gospel; the world hath not a right understanding in this mystery. Christ came into the world to save sinners, but not to reconcile God to our sins, to make him less holy, or his law less strict, or sin less odious; and his free pardon is not to encourage us to go on in our sins; but a wicked heart, likes spider, will suck poison from those flowers from whence a bee sucketh honey.
2. Let us not give occasion to others to think so, either - (1.) By entertaining opinions that may countenance this abuse, as the setting up a naked dependence on Christ without a care of holiness, or Christ's merit against his Spirit; relying on his reconciling, and neglecting his renewing grace; that we are justified before we repent or believe; that all sins past, present, or to come are pardoned at once; that we need not trouble ourselves with scruples about offending God; that the greatest confidence of our own good estate is the strongest and best faith. (2.) Nor by practices. Christians must be most averse from sin, and all enormous practices, else you dishonour Christ in the world; but let the blame and shame lie on us, and not on the gospel.
3. Let us not harbour this mistake in our own bosoms. We are marvellous apt to do so; but hereby we forfeit the comfort and privilege of Christians, and it concerneth God to avenge the quarrel of his grace against us. Now harbour it we do, if we grow more careless and negligent in duties, less circumspect in our conversations, less humble for sins, and venture upon them with greater boldness and security. If you think you need to be less troubled for sin, less earnest and watchful against it, as if since Christ died for the expiation of it, it were a smaller matter than before to sin against God, you are guilty of this abuse.
Use 2. To exhort you to three things.
1. To carry yourselves as those that are dead to sin; be sure that its dominion and reign be broken, and its strength and power every day more weakened; you subdue it thoroughly root and branch, and let your minds be more intent on this, that you may not sin: 1 John 3:9, 'Whoso is born of God doth not commit sin, for his seed remaineth in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.' See how this is fulfilled in you, and what conscience you make of your baptismal vow every day.
2. Honour grace. You should not only esteem it, and advance it in your minds, but set forth the glory of it in word and deed: Eph. 1: 5, 12: ‘Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, that we should be to the praise of his glory.' The whole strain of your life and conversation should be to the praise of grace, that our actions might speak for it, though we be silent. To this end consider, God hath trusted you with the honour of his grace, therefore you should be eminently much better than other men: Mat. 5:16, 'Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven,' 1 Peter 3:9, and set forth the genuine and kindly workings of it
3. Fortify your minds against this abuse, which is so natural to us.
[1.] God's principal will is that we should obey his laws rather than need his pardon. The precept is before the sanction, before sin came into the world; he pardoneth, that we may return to our duty, Heb. 9: 14; Luke 1:74; Rev. 5:9,10; therefore to make wounds for Christ to cure is not the part of a good Christian.
[2.] Remember what was Christ's main design: 1 John 3:5, 'To take away sin,' not to take away obedience. Many think, though they sin never so much, their pardon will be ready and easy. Oh no! not so lightly, when you wilfully and presumptuously run into sin.
[3.] Loose, carnal, and careless Christians, that wallow in all filthiness, and hope to be saved, are rather of the faction of Christians than of the religion of Christians: 2 Tim. 2:19, 'Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity;' 1 Peter 1:17,18, 'Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear, forasmuch as you are not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversations, received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot'
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