Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	assurance_n	faith_n	justify_v	2,314	5	9.2915	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59036	The doubting beleever, or, A treatise containing 1. the nature, 2. the kinds, 3. the springs, 4. the remedies of doubtings, incident to weak beleevers by Obadiah Sedgwick ...	Sedgwick, Obadiah, 1600?-1658.	1641 (1641)	Wing S2369; ESTC R19426	113,906	390

Lord saith the penitent I acknowledge my sins and am ●orry for my transgressions but I intend to run on the score no longer Thou art a debtor saith God I am Lord saith the Beleever and thou hast said If any man 1 Joh. 2. 1. sin he hath an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous and he is the propitiation for sins and I beleeve on him Lord I take him to be my sin-offering and in his bloud onely I seek for pardon and redemption from all my sinnes This were the way to support our selves against our many and strong doubtings about pardon of sins Yet the Lord knowes I have repented of them and I doe beleeve in Jesus Christ for the pardon of them I heare and know that he is the Mediator of the New Testament and that his bloud satisfies for all sorts of debtors and debts too Though one sin may differ from another yet his me● it and satisfaction differs not from it selfe but is all-sufficient and therefore I acknowledge the debt and rest on his bloud for a full discharge 3. Discharges in Justification are not repealed they are not called in againe Peccata non redeunt i. Subsequent sins and falls doe not nullifie and evacuate former grants and pardons for as much as 1. Pardon of sin springs from speciall love and mercy which alter not their consigned acts 2. It is founded in an unalterable and absolute and constant satisfaction for sinne is not pardoned for any dignity in the person In the person pardoned there is no reason or cause of pardon but that is in the bloud of Christ which bloud alters and lessens and abates not though our carriages doe Hence it is that pardon of sin in Justification is styled the blotting out of the hand-writing Col. 2. 14. If a writing be blurred a little and somewhat blotted yet it may be read but if it be blotted out it is no more legible and who can be called to account upon record when the writings are obliterated The same phrase is used Esay 44. 22. I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions and as a cloud thy sinnes Where me thinks something else falls in to our comfort viz. That God himselfe doth blot out Though an under-officer should blot out an indictment that perhaps may help nothing but when the King doth it who is chiefe Judge then the indictment cannot returne Now it is the Lord himselfe who doth blot out transgressions he doth it who onely hath power of life and death of condemning or absolving In like manner there is another phrase Mica 7. 19. Thou wilt cast all their sinnes into the depths of the sea If a thing were cast into a river which might be fathomed then it might be brought up againe or if it were cast upon the sea onely yet it might be discerned and taken up againe but when it is in the depths cast into the depths the bottome of the sea now it cannot be fathomed up againe By which Metaphor the Lord intends to expresse unto us the powerfull energy of pardoning mercy that our sins shall rise no more against us He will cleare them so that they being once forgiven shall come on the account no more He will drowne their guilt that it shall not come up against us before him the second time Therefore Paul discoursing of Justification Rom. 4. hee useth another phrase to expresse this point ver 7. Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered Covered Covering is such an action which is opposed to disclosure and judiciall evidences and to be covered is to be hid so and closed as not to appeare with a judiciall guilt upon it Now the Lord here is said to cover sinne in Justification What is that That is the Lord will look on those sinnes no more with a judiciall eye he will not call them to account any more that is the meaning of the phrase As when a Prince reads over many Treasons and meets with such and such which he hath pardoned he reads on he passeth by he now takes no notice of them he is not stirred he sends not our against those whom he hath pardoned So c. This is for God to cover sin viz. not to looke on the sin pardoned with a judiciall eye It is not as some most empty and dull heads fancie it God doth not see sin at all and he cannot Of all the opinions in the world this is the most ridiculous and childish to men who beleeve an All-seeing God But to cover sin is not simply not to see it but to look it over as it were and not to sit or stand upon it with a judiciall eye i to account for pardoned sinnes no more Hence in the New Covenant God promising to justifie or to pardon sin he saith not onely I will forgive their iniquity but addes I will remember their sin no more Jer. 31. 34. What is that That is if I once As the Gospel needs to be givē but once so a mans sin needs but once to be forgiven once is enough because if once then for ever forgive their sin I wil not forgive it againe it shall not need againe to be forgiven once shall serve the turne I will remember it no more The meaning is it shall quite be forgotten I will no more plead with them for what I have once pardoned I confesse that the sense and fruit and assurance of a sin pardoned this may redire Note returne this may be lost and got and the acts of faith concerning the particular pardon The apprehensiō of pardon is variable and yet the pardon it self is immutable of a particular sin may doe so but Gods justifying act his pardoning act is a free and constant act Otherwise if he pardoned 〈◊〉 respectively upon an absolute Incessation about sinne there were no flesh living that could be justified 4. Discharges in Justification reach not onely to the guilt but also to the consequents of guilt For it is a true And remissa culpa remittitur poena rule Justificatio tollit poenalia Therefore saith the Apostle Rom. 8. 1. There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus You know that if the body falls then the shadow which attends the body that falls too and if the debt be discharged the prison is discharged We have by the bloud of Christ the forgivenesse of our sins and therefore the remission of all satisfying punishments Why else doth the Apostle say Gal. 3. 13. Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law being made a curse for us As Christ is said to be made sin for us 2 Cor. 5. so is he here said to be made a curse for us He is made sinne for us by taking upon him the guilt of our sinnes and he is made a curse for us by bearing that wrath and punishment which was due to us because of our sinnes Nay let me

from the Spirit which shines in the renewed heart by an unspeakable light 1 Cor. 2. 12 and manifests unto it the things given unto it of God and so seals and witnesseth the truth and goodnesse of our particular interests in God and Christ according to the word of God 2. Another is from faith which doth testifie the interests of the soule in that happinesse which it finds revealed in the Word For that which faith beleeves by a direct act in the Word it may testifie of the same to the person by a refexive * By assurance act 3. A third is from Conscience which beholding the simplicity and godly sincerity of the heart testifies unto it against all opposition that this blessed frame is in the soule and this testimony being concordant with that of the word the soul is thereby greatly sustained forasmuch as this is knowne before viz. A sincere temper is happy and now Conscience clearing that temper the soule hereupon is much cheered 2. Our condition falls under a three-fold consideration A threefold estate 1. Sometimes under the accusations of Conscience Conscience doth speak and testifie but it is either that our hearts are totally base and sinfull and corrupt or that in such and such a particular it is not right it was not perfect but sinfull and degenerating 2. Sometimes under the excusations of Conscience where Conscience testifies and acquits and speaks peace either As in Paul loc cit As in David about Saul about the frame of the heart or rectitude of some particular action and course 3. Sometimes under a neutrall act or work of the Conscience i. The Conscience like Absolom to Ammon 2 Sam. 13. 22. speaks unto a person neither good nor bad It doth not accuse him nor doth it excuse him it doth not speak terror nor doth it speak peace it doth not charge any speciall guilt nor doth it give us a particular discharge of any Now this is the time of fears and doubts I will shew you why because 1. A negative state satisfies not a tender Christian It doth not satisfie a tender soule that God looks not like an enemy unlesse also he looks as a friend or that Conscience doth not check but that it should excuse It doth trouble us many times that in our exemptions from trouble wee yet find no Peace-speaker 2. It gives suspicion of a neutrall estate because Conscience seems to behave it selfe as a neutrall neither against us nor for us I call that a neutrall estate which is not eminently evill it hath some good in it and doth some good but is not so good as to be gracious therefore the civill estate is a neutrall it doth not rise to be so bad as the worst nor to be so good as the best people are Now this estate absolutely considered is bad it is an evill estate it is an estate in which if a man lives and dies and goes not beyond it he cannot be saved 3. It may breed an expectation of the worse testimony of Conscience for withdrawments are sometimes the forerunners of some bitter intentions It fell out ill with Saul when God withdrew himselfe from him So when Conscience withdraws perhaps my Conscience hath found matter against me and as it doth not now speak peace so perhaps shortly it may speak bitter things unto me 4 Nay Conscience is Gods Vice-gerent it is his Deputy and therefore in the silences and withdrawments of it wee look through and feare the disposition of God himself towards us because the servants do ordinarily expresse the conceits and inclinations and affections of their masters And this is certaine that we doe in an angry conscience behold Conscience is the looking-glasse alwayes an angry God and so in a cheerfull conscience a gracious God and so shall we in a silent conscience suspect a doubtfull God We doe ordinarily judge how God is towards us by what we find and feele Conscience to be towards us This is the glasse in which we see his favours or frowns These are the springs of Doubtings which I have enlarged in their opening unto you it is likely there may be more then these I could also deliver you more about the temporall estate but that is out of our scope and compasse now It now remains that I descend to the closing up of these springs to the cures and remedies of these Doubtings which is the last thing proposed CAP. V. The Cures and Remedies of Doubtings HEre lies our next and greatest work And therefore as Physitians in this part are more cautelous to administer things which are in their qualities most proper and in their measures most convenient so must we in the healings and closings of the spirituall distempers of the soule And therefore that this work may be happily performed I shall desiring Gods grace to assist and blesse prescribe unto you 1. The particular cures which Two sorts of cures Particular Generall shall answer all those particular springs of doubtings before mentioned Then 2. The generall Cures and Remedies which may extend to the help of all or most of our doubtings if time and leasure hold out The particular Cures 1. Naturall corruption was The first cure answering the first cause of doubtings the first spring of Doubtings and Mortification is the first help and remedy That is the Disease and this is the Cure I may say that of our faith which the Apostle speaks of our persons Rom. 8. 13. If yee Rom. 8. 13 through the Spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live The more our sinnes doe die in us the more our faith will live in us We are diseased men take us in our best condition Similies and you know the more any disease doth lose of its strength the more doth our health rise up and thrive and so we are as a garden which hath many plants and severall weeds the abating of these the rooting up and killing of these contributes the greater reliefe and strengthning to our plants The Apostle Heb. 10. 22. Heb. 10. 22 would have them to draw neare with a true heart in full assurance of Faith he would have them to cast out their doubtings in their approaches unto God he would have them to come with assurance with a full assurance to come so as verily to be perswaded of Gods acceptation of them not indifferently to come with May be I shall be accepted may be I shall not this is a doubtfull approaching But what doth he adjoyne to this exhortation Observe the next words Having your hearts sprinkled from an evill conscience d. As long as your hearts are evill as long as Conscience can charge you for entertained evill you will be wavering and doubtfull But if your hearts were sprinkled if the evill of sin were washed from them then you might come with a full assurance of faith i. Then faith might fully perswade you to come confidently unto God for