1. His dying for us appears, (1.) To be wonderful in itself. (2.)
In his preparations for that work.

(1.) It appears to be wonderful in itself, and that both with
respect to the nature of that death, as also, with respect to the
persons for whom he so died.

The love of Christ appears to be wonderful by the death he died: In
that he died, in that he died such a death. 'Twas strange love in
Christ that moved him to die for us: strange, because not according
to the custom of the world. Men do not use, in cool blood,
deliberately to come upon the stage or ladder, to lay down their
lives for others; but this did Jesus Christ, and that too for such,
whose qualification, if it be duly considered, will make this act
of his, far more amazing, He laid down his life for his enemies
(Rom 5), and for those that could not abide him; yea, for those,
even for those that brought him to the cross: not accidentally, or
because it happened so, but knowingly, designedly, (Zech 12:10),
he knew it was for those he died, and yet his love led him to lay
down his life for them. I will add, That those very people for
whom he laid down his life, though they by all sorts of carriages
did what they could to provoke him to pray to God his Father,
that he would send and cut them off by the flaming sword of angels
(Matt 26:53), would not be provoked, but would lay down his life
for them. Nor must I leave off here: We never read that Jesus
Christ was more cheerful in all his life on earth, than when he
was going to lay down his life for them, now he thanked God (Luke
22:19), now he sang (Matt 26:30).