Selected quad for the lemma: act_n
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A42685
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The nature of justification opened in a sermon on Romans V. 1. By Mr. Gibbons, sometime preacher at Black-Fryers, London.
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Gibbon, John, 1629-1718.
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1695
(1695)
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Wing G651; ESTC R216248
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24,547
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32
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Law of Works Christ's Satisfaction justieth us formally as our proper legal Righteousness I call it our Righteousness because it becomes imputed to us upon our Believing Faith being our Gospel Title by pleading which we lay claim to all the Benefits accruing from the Merit of Christ's Performance to all Effects Uses and Purposes as if it had been personally our own I call it our legal Righteousness because thereby the Law of God owns it self fully apaid and acquiesceth in it as in full Reparations and Amends made unto it for the injury and dishonour received by the Sin of Man We must plead this against all the Challenges and Accusations of the Law who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's Elect it is Christ that died c. Rom. 8.33 And thus our legal Righteousness required in the first Covenant that of Works is wholly without us in our Redeemer yet imputed upon our Account Thirdly The Gospel justifieth quâ Lex lata 3 3. How the Gospel as it is the Law of Faith for the very Tenour of the Gospel-Covenant is Believe and thou shalt be saved Fourthly Faith justifieth vi Legis latae 4 4. How Faith as it is our Evangelical Righteousness or our keeping the Gospel-Law for that Law suspends Justification upon Believing Faith pretends to no Merit or Vertue of its own but professedly avows its dependance upon the Merit of Christ's Satisfaction as our legal Righteousness on which it layeth hold nor can it shew any other Title to be it self our Evangelical Righteousness but only God's Sanction who chose this Act of believing to the honour of being the Justifying Act because it so highly honoureth Christ so that as a most judicious Pen expresseth it the Act of Believing is as the Silver but God's Authority in the Gospel-Sanction is the King's Coin or Image Stamp'd upon it which gives it all its value as to Justification Without this Stamp it could never have been currant and if God had set this Stamp on any other Grace as Love that then would have been currant and have justified us as Faith doth now Fifthly God justifieth in a proper sense two ways 5 5. How God First As a Legislator Secondly As a Judge 1. As a Legislator enacting by his Soveraign Authority that fweet and gracious Law of the New Covenant by vertue of whose Tenour every Sinner that believes is justified from the Guilt of Sin from which he could not be justified by the Law of Moses Acts 13.38 39. This Law of Justification by Faith is God's own Act and Deed the great Instrumentum pacis between God and Man he hath proclaimed his Letters Patents the King of Heaven and Earth hath in the Gospel our Magna Charta given his Warrant under his own Broad Seal That he that believeth shall not be condemned 2. As a Judge the God of Heaven may in three respects be said to justifie a Believer First Forthwith upon his Believing God owneth him secretly within himself as a Person justified God esteems and approves of him as in that state unto which he hath by believing a Title good in Law an indefeasible Right a justified Estate emergeth actually as soon as Faith the Law-Title thereunto emergeth as a necessary Resultance by virtue of the Tenour of the Gospel-Law which only justified Virtually Potentially and Conditionally before every Believer in general but now Actually Absolutely and in particular it justifieth him as a Believer when he is so Secondly At the moment of Dissolution God justifieth as the Judge of all the Earth passing a private Sentence and Award unto everlasting Life upon every believing Soul Thirdly But Eminently at the last Day when the Ancient of Days shall take the Throne and in open Court before the whole Creation by publick Sentence for ever acquit and discharge Believers at that great and last Assizes Sixthly 6 6. How Works Shall I need to add that Works are said to justifie us Jam. 2.4 because they justifie our Faith or demonstrate before God and Man and to our own Consciences that our Faith is not a dead and barren but a true and living one by its fruitfulness in well-doing Seventhly 7 7. How the Spirit But I must not forget Lastly That the Spirit of God is said to justifie us 1 Cor. 6.11 and that two ways First Directly by working Faith in the Heart which is one of the Fruits of the Spirit Gal. 5.22 Now Causa causae est etiam causa causati the Spirit justifieth as it is the Author of the justifying Grace Secondly Reflexibly The Divine Spirit clears up Justification to a Believer's Conscience by discovering the truth of Faith by working Assurance and by sealing a Believer to the day of Redemption The Spirit it self beareth witness with our spirits that we are the Children of God and if Children then heirs c. Rom. 8.16 17. Thus I have at length done with my first Task the opening of the Point which finds its self summed up in this Definition Justification is a judicial act of God as Law-giver and Judge of the world graciously discharging a Believer for the sake of Christ's satisfaction from the condemnation of the Law of Works by the tenour of the Gospel-Law or New Covenant which requireth of accepteth from imputeth unto sinners faith in Christ Jesus as their righteousness see Rom. 3.25 6 7 8. Rom. 4.5 Phil. 3.9 Vse Refut To improve it now which was my other Task by way of Refutation I infer against the Antinomians First That Justification is not from Eternity 1. Because a person must be charged with Guilt before he is justified or discharged but nothing can be before Eternity if discharg'd from Eternity when was he charged what from Eternity too then he will be at once eternally charged with and discharged from Guilt which if any excuse from a Contradiction they are much wiser than I am 2. My Text convinceth them actual Faith is not from Eternity therefore not Justification before God for if Faith justifie us not before God but only at the Bar of Conscience then there will be no Justification at God's Bar at all once mention'd in Scripture for Works do it at Man's Bar. What is it I wonder that justifieth from Eternity Not God's Decree to justifie for then his Decree to glorifie would make Glorification from Eternity too but Decreta Dei nihil ponúnt actu in subjecto God's Decrees are immanent Acts and pass nothing actually upon the Creature 3. A justified person was actually under Condemnation whil'st he was an Unbeliever Rom. 3.18 He that believeth not is condemned already but he could not be at all Condemned if justified from Eternity 4. Saint Paul expresly affirms that the believing Corinthians were not once but now were justified 1 Cor. 6.11 Such were some of you but ye are washed but ye are sanctified but ye are justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus c. Secondly I infer against them that
an Eclipse of the Glory of his God-head And his passive Righteousness was every where active because what he suffered was not by constraint or against his Will no it was his own voluntary Act and Deed all along let me instance in the greatest of his Sufferings his very dying was the Product both of the freeness of his Love and the Majesty of his Power John 10.17 18. Rev. 1.5 In the third place Both Christ's active and passive Righteousness what he did and what he suffered partake in common of the form of satisfaction therefore they are both integral parts or joynt Ingredients thereof for forma dat esse but this brings me to the second Enquiry 2. Query What is the form of Christ's Satisfaction or that which renders it Satisfactory I answer the infinite Merit of what he did and suffered which infinite Merit stands 1. In the dignity of his Person the fullness of the God-head dwelt in him bodily Col. 2.9 John 1.14 Now for the work of a Servant to be done by the Lord of all renders his Active and for him to suffer as a Malefactor between Malefactors who was God blessed for evermore renders also his passive Righteousness infinitely Meritorious no wonder the Blood of Christ cleanseth from all Sin for it is the Blood of God Acts 20.28 1 John 1.7 And this is the Reason why the Righteousness of one redounds unto all for the justification of life Rom. 5.18 19. because his active and passive Righteousness is infinitely of more value than all that the Creatures in Heaven and Earth could have done or suffered to Eternity the very Man Christ Jesus is above all the Angels Heb. 1.6 for he is the Man that is God's fellow Zech. 13.7 And this infinite Worthiness of the Redeemer's Person you have excellently described as irradiating and infinitely exalting all he did and suffered Phil. 2.6 7 8 9. Heb. 7.24 25 28. 2. The active and passive Righteousness of Christ are of infinite Merit because not at all due but both meer supererrogations of an infinitely glorious Person And First For his active Righteousness it stood in his Obedience to the Ceremonial and Moral Laws 1. His Obedience to the Ceremonial Law was a meer supererrogation for the Substance to comply with the Shadows the Antitype to do homage to its own Types besides he submitted to those very Ordinances whose End and Institution supposeth Guilt and whose Nature argues them designed only for the use of Sinners what foreskin of Impurity had he to be cut off in Circumcision what Filth to be wash'd away in Baptism Did the holy Child Jesus defile his Mother's Womb. as common Mortals do that are conceived in Sin and brought forth in Iniquity And yet he was Circumcised and Baptized and his Mother offered for her Purification Luke 1.21 22. chap. 3.21 No imaginable Obligation lay on him to these Submissions being to him meer Ciphers wholly insignificant 2. His Obedience to the Moral Law Although it must be granted that as Man it was his Duty Gal. 4.4 yet was it not his Duty to become Man True a Creature 's homage was due from him when a Creature a Servant's Work when in the form of a Servant but the whole was free and Arbitrary because his entring into that State was so for what but his own infinite Love could ever move the Eternal Word to pitch his Tent in our Nature What Obligation lay on the Heir of all things to take the form of a Servant Who bound the Eternal Son of God to become in the fullness of time the Son of Man And as his active Righteousness so Secondly His Passive too was a meer Supererrogation for his Almighty Father's Holy All-seeing Eye could never espy the least Iniquity in him to punish What had the Divine Justice to do with him for he was a sinless Person he suffered not for himself Dan. 9.26 No for us 2 Cor. 5.21 And therefore since no Obligation lay on him to do what he did or to suffer what he suffered he may impute the Merit both of the one and the other to whomsoever and upon what terms soever he and his Father please But before I come to consider the terms upon which Christ's Satisfaction is applied I must answer some Questions and clear the Scruples in the way 1. Object 1. What is become of the Law of that first Covenant made with Adam in Paradise Gen. 2.17 repeated again to the Jews Deut. 27.26 The summe of which you have fully expressed Ezek. 18.4 The soul that sinneth it shall dye I answer It is not fully executed nor abrogated but released or dispensed with First It is not fully executed for there is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus c. Rom. 8.1 Secondly It is not abrogated for it is in part executed upon Believers they are liable to the first or natural Death which is the wages of sin although the second death hath no power over them besides all manner of Chastisements and Afflictions Psal 89.30 31 32. And also that Law is totally executed upon finally Impenitent Unbelievers over whom not the first only but the second Death also hath Power 2 Thess 1.8 For he that believeth not is condemned already John 3.18 That is the Gospel finds him and every one in a state of Condemnation but those who believe it proclaims Deliverance to those who through Unbelief reject it judging themselves unworthy of everlasting Life see Acts 13.46 it leaves such as it found them viz under the Condemnation of the old Covenant since they refuse the pardoning Mercy of the New Thirdly I answer therefore positively That the first Covenant is released and dispensed with by super-inducing a New Covenant of Grace over it That whosoever closeth with and comes into the terms of the New should be exempted from the Rigor and Extremity i. e. from the Eternal Condemnation of the old John 3.16 It is not said He that believes shall not be Sick shall not be Afflicted shall not Die No but he shall not perish Thus you see the Covenant of Works as to its Execution upon such as are in the Covenant of Grace is in the chief part restrained but yet in some part inflicted They never shall complain under the Eternal and Destructive yet they do complain under the Temporal and Corrective Punishment of their Sins Lam. 3.39 Yet more particularly for the clearer understanding of this we must consider that the first Covenant lays a double Obligation on sinful Man First In reference to what is past and here it requires Satisfaction and Reparation from us for our Sin in breaking it And Secondly In reference to the future after such Satisfaction and amends made it requires perfect Conformity still as at first absolute Obedience to all God's Commands being the Eternal Debt of the reasonable Creature to that God that made it in his own Image if therefore we could which hath already been proved to be impossible ever