Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	believe_v	faith_n	justification_n	5,240	5	9.4416	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45147	Pacification touching the doctrinal dissent among our united brethren in London being an answer to Mr. Williams and Mr. Lobb both, who have appealed in one point (collected for an error) to this author, for his determination about it : together with some other more necessary points falling in, as also that case of non-resistance, which hath always been a case of that grand concern to the state, and now more especially, in regard to our loyalty to King William, and association to him, resolved, on that occasion / by Mr. John Humfrey.	Humfrey, John, 1621-1719.	1696 (1696)	Wing H3697; ESTC R16468	49,303	49

we are accepted as Righteous through his Merits does the Commutation we find there consist yea as I have intimated a little before even that whole Commutation of Persons with which our Brethren do so puzzle themselves and vex Mr. W. I would not have them offended with me as with him though I speak out what he does not that here in good earnest is the full of the matter and excepting the Darkness of Prejudice which in most is as dark as Pit there is no more in it This being so I must not admit any such Interpretation of the place that is framed according to our common Doctrine which teaches that by Faith we receive Christ's Righteousness that this receiving makes it ours and that God then reckons us as having performed the Condition of the Law in Christ and so justifies us by it All which is quite contrary to the words of this Text that says Christ is the end of the Law and to this meaning in regard to its Condition seeing this Doctrine makes the Law to have no end but to stand to the great day and that by this Condition we are to be Justified subverting not only this Text but the whole Gospel This yet is most evident in the Verses following for the Apostle distinguishing the Righteousness of the Law and the Righteousness of Faith makes this Righteousness to be the confessing with the Mouth and believing with the Heart which are Acts of ours and not the Obedience of Christ without us imputed So that if you shall give 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 any other signification than this the Scope yet and Purpose of the place must be the same I have staid so long on this Text because I have omitted it when I paraphrased the others in my Book of Justification where all I say here and more is made out I know there are Divines who make Justification to lye in Pardon altogether and say we are made Righteous in such Texts only by being pardoned The being freed say they from the Guilt of all Sin both of Omission and Commission does introduce Righteousness as the expelling Darkness does Light and for a Sinner to be justified or made Righteous must be by a Righteousness in regard to the Sanction of the Law when in regard to the Preceptive part no Man is Righteous in himself or in Christ whose Suretiship does reach so far and no farther This do they indeed very cleverly say Nevertheless I am convinced that the Apostle by Justification when he discourses of it to be by Faith and not Works means not Pardon which is an Effect thereof I count not the formal reason I have one Argument for this convinces me in my Book of Justification the late second Edition 48. which yet another perhaps may frame for me something better I observe also that the Scripture denominates Men Righteous still from their walking uprightly not from Pardon P. 22. I have more elaborately evinced that the Righteousness of God in opposition to Works is this that I stand upon P. 27 40 57 58. And upon the same account I have added farther in a Note here is the Gospel called the Ministration of Righteousness See what I there offer P. 43. if it doth not evince it By such Notices as these which aliunde too I must say I have not had am I confirmed in my own Opinion Another word still with Mr. W. That God does look upon us or account that we Suffered and made Satisfaction legally in Christ's Person or that Christ Suffered and made Satisfaction strictly in our Persons which I count to be all one or hitherto have and yet that Christ suffered in our place or stead Mr. W. and I both hold Now both these I take to be consistent because Christ's Sufferings and Satisfaction is ours or in our place or stead only in regard to the Effects But if he suffered and satisfied in our place or stead or his Satisfaction be ours any more or otherwise than as to the Effects I perceive than neither his Brethren on one side nor I on the other can see by what distinction unless by words only without the thing that makes the difference when these Distinctions without a Difference do still quite spoil all he can evade us but that he must come over quite to me or them let him choose which Believe it Christ died in our stead is by Interpretation only the Believer Unpunished What Mr. W. offers upon this account in his Man made Righteous p. 76 to 83. I have considered and it is but an honest thing to give a Man his weight Christ's Righteousness is double he counts either his Performance of the Mediatorial Covenant or his Right to the Reward being performed The one is a Righteousness in relation to the Precept the other in relation to the Premiant Sanction The former Righteousness is imputed to the Believer he says Mediately which is I think but the same I say it is imputed only in regard to the Effects This is the Simile he uses and the Explication makes good God looks on what Christ did and suffered he urges as done for us and therefore what he did and suffered is ours as to the Benefits But God does not look on what Christ did and suffered as done by us and therefore what he did and suffered is ours no otherwise The latter Righteousness then he says is imputed to Believers Immediately which he explains thus A part of that Reward Christ hath a Right to is to have a Seed that they shall believe and be pardoned Now Believers have this Right which Christ hath that they shall be pardoned It is made theirs They have not only the Benefits but are invested in Christ's Right to those Benefits They have not only a Right to Pardon but have Christ's Right to that Pardon This he says but how can this be Christ's Right to his Reward is as properly his own Righteousness and inherent in him as his Righteousness of Obedience Both are Accidents in him as their Subject One of them the Righteousness of his Obedience cannot possibly be ours in it self because Accidents do not Migrare à subjecto in subjectum and how can Mr. W. say so of this If he does not make this Right of Christ to be ours in se it is as good as to say nothing And when the Obedience of Christ is not in se ours but by Imputation and that only in the Effects how the Right to the Reward which is Christ's Right can be so ours without this Migration which is impossible I am yet to consider and digest not We cannot be made inherently Righteous by his Righteousness and how shall we be so enrighted by his Right But after this If Christ's Right it self or his Right in se be not the Believers but only the virtue of it then is there here a Cobweb spun finely when all comes but to an Imputation of this Right as well as of his Obedience as to the

of the business There is one Mediator which is the common Appellation of the same import as Surety between God and Man the Man Christ Jesus who gave himself a Ransome for all to be testified in due time 2 Tim. 2.5 6. Christ was a Surety but a Surety in the Scripture Sense not in an Arbitrary Sense Christ was a Surety not in an Antinomian Sense but in a Sense which must be agreeable to every thing else that is said of him in Scripture This is safe and this is true and here I will stand by Mr. W. But whether Christ's Suretiship is to be made commensurate with his Priesthood to make good his or any others Notion of it I question It is no where said we have a Surety though a High Priest and Intercessor now in Heaven As for the Commutation in the next place then of Persons I acknowledge such a one accordingly as is necessary to the Impetration of our Redemption but I understand none so as to go into the Application Christ took on him our Flesh made Satisfaction in our stead and procured an Act of Grace or Pardon for all But there is no Commutation I know as to particular Persons in the Point of Justification If Christ made an exchange of his Righteousness with Peter for his Sins any otherwise than as to the Impetration of Pardon on condition that concerns all alike then Christ's Righteousness must now be Peter's and James and John could never have it In Christ's uniting himself to us by his taking our Nature Obeying Suffering satisfying God's Justice I acknowledge a Commutation even such to wit that our Sins were so imputed to him as that he died for them and in our stead understanding the Phrases aright and his Righteousness so imputed as to be the Cause that upon our believing we enjoy the Benefit But in Christ's uniting us to him by giving his Spirit to work in us that Condition whereby we have our Right to the Benefit there is nothing done by him in our stead nothing by us in his no new no other no father Imputation The Fruit of his Purchase Pardon and Salvation by a Law of Grace cannot be formaliter his and if that the communicates to us be not his how is there a Commutation Of this Sacrifice and Righteousness it self we are uncapable Of the Effect or Fruits Christ is uncapable What he hath not he cannot communicate what he hath we cannot receive It is true he hath receive potestatem conferendi and in that respect eminenter may be said to receive for us his own Benefits but for us then must be only bono nostro if it were loco nostro our selves could not have them The Punishment we deserved Christ bare loco nostro therefore we are not to bear it The Benefits Christ purchased we have therefore loco nostro he could not receive them There is there can be no Substitution of Person in our partaking the Benefits purchased as there was there must be in the purchasing them for us There is a Chapter on this Head in my Book called Peaceable Disquisitions I refer thither for farther Explication With Mr. W. I believe speaking strictly that Christ was no Surety of the Covenant of Works so as to enter into the same Bond before or after it were but trifling to make a Dispute of that it was forfeited And that his Reasons for it are good his fourth especially as to the ill Consequences following upon it Against Mr. W. I apprehend Christ to be no Surety neither of the Covenant of Grace in a strict proper Sense as I say also in my Sheet because the business of this Suretiship I said now does lye mainly in obtaining for us this Covenant as Moses dealt in his Mediatorship and not in the undertaking on God's part which needs not and on our part that it should be kept In this sense do I understand the Prophet when God says he will give Christ for a Covenant of the People that is to mediate this Covenant to procure it The word Surety I say again must be taken in such a Sense and not any other which agrees with every thing else said of Christ in the Scripture or with the whole Doctrine of the Gospel besides And that Doctrine is false I count which confines the Gospel-Covenant to the Elect. Not that he undertook that all he mediated for should do all that is their Duty says the throughly Understanding Mr. Baxter in his Paraphrase on the place As for Mr. W. I will take leave to say he is to me a considerable Man especially as to his Talent Elocution which yet unless his Judgment also be Good Staid and Unpassionate as it appears may prove to him a Temptation There is nothing I distrust him so much in as in his Distinctions which I cannot but suspect sometimes through his Facility of words to be made rather in diverse Expressions than in the reality of the things he would distinguish I am afraid least he should hereby come to yield more in our main Cause than we can again recover This appears more particularly in these two Points wherein I am more particularly concerned the Conditionality of the Covenant and the Business of Justification It is to be known and acknowledged there are several places in the Old Testament which speak of God's Circumcising the Heart giving a new one putting his Fear into it so as they that have this Promise fulfilled to them shall enter into Covenant with God in Sincerity and never again depart from him Upon which account it is called an Everlasting Covenant and a second Covenant in Opposition to the first that the Israelites brake as it is in the Epistle to the Hebrews In these places then we have a Promise for they are all I suppose in the account of most one and the same Promise which is an Absolute Promise that is to give that which hath no Condition required of us for the obtaining it the first Grace the new Heart Faith and Repentance in order to our Salvation Now the Promise being Absolute and called the Covenant This is my Covenant I will make with the House of Israel after those days saith the Lord I will put my Laws into their Minds and write them in their Hearts And I will be to them a God and they shall be to me a People the Antinomian does apprehend it to be the Covenant of Grace and that the Covenant of Grace therefore is not Conditional for there is no Condition in this Promise and if that we call the Condition is on God's part given and not required as a Condition to be performed on our parts the Covenant is without Condition Here now the Orthodox Calvinist who is neither Arminian or Antinomian are of two sorts one whose Genius carries them so much against Arminianism that they come as near as they can to the Antinomian And the other whose Genius leads them so far from Antinomianism that they come

the ends of it by a perfect obeying of it and suffering for Man's Sin against it and thereby Merit to all Mankind it being done in their behalf a Right to Pardon and Salvation or to Impunity and Life which yet is to be given them upon such Terms as should please him and the Redeemer for so long as it was not the Persons themselves that obeyed and suffered but another in their stead and that by way of Satisfaction not strict Payment the Benefit of that Obedience and Suffering might be disposed at their Will Now this Right to Impunity and Life obtained is given or granted in an Act of Grace declared in the Gospel which runs thus that whosoever he be that Believes Repents and lives sincerely according to it shall be pardoned and saved Even as in an Act of Pardon by Parliament a Man hath committed Treason or the like the Treason is still by the Law Death but upon such an Act passing those Persons that are guilty are pardoned if qualified according to the Act In like manner that Man who performs this Gospel-Condition hath this Right by vertue of this Act Law or Covenant of Grace Grant Deed of Gift Will of Christ Testament or Gospel The Righteousness of Christ is the Meritorious Cause of it and this Act of Grace the Instrument of Donation or Law-title Here then we see is a Righteousness Evangelical that we have and must have and here is a Right to Impunity and Life which you may if you will call a Righteousness too that we have also But the Righteousness of Christ we have here only in the Effect As in the common instance I have a Friend made Slave in Algiers I give a 100 l. for his Ransom he never has nor sees the 100 l. but the Money is his in the Liberty he possesseth Note When the former sort of Divines mentioned say that by the Imputation of Christ's Death to us we become recti in Curia and there must be then a Righteousness of his Life imputed farther to entitle us to Heaven they understand still that it is by the Law of Works that we are to be tried and judged But let all understand aright as before that it is by the Law of Grace and supposing then we were thereby recti in curia that Righteousness required farther unto this Title must be the Righteousness of that Law we are judged by to wit our Evangelical Righteousness only which is accepted unto Life or made the Condition instead of that of the Law upon the account of this Righteousness of Christ Jesus We must distinguish here to avoid Prejudice and least the tender be offended There is the Duty and the Condition of this Law the Law of Grace the Law of Christ or the Gospel by which we are to be judged God hath constituted the Duty the Condition the Reward the Penalty of it There are few of our Ministers and much less of our People are sensible of the Advantage this Doctrine brings us and the Soundness of it No Man we must know does perform the Duty but every Man must perform the Condition or he cannot be saved This Condition as obtained for the World is the grand Benefit of Christ's Purchase or main Fruit of his Death and is accepted when performed only through him It is not for my Works or Merits sayest thou that my Person is accepted but for Christ's Righteousness and in this alone is my Comfort And I say it is not for the Works sake or Merit of any thing or all we do but for Christ's sake that the Condition is accepted and it is in this is my Comfort In this it is that we have or can have any grounded Sustentation To say thou art Justified by Christ's Righteousness when yet thou must acknowledge his Righteousness is none of thine unless thou hast performed the Condition What empty Comfort is that But to say that through Christ's Merits and Righteousness this it self that I do is the Condition here is Comfort indeed That what we are enabled by his Grace I say to do how little soever if sincerely done if it be but the Grain of Mustard-seed in a hungring and thirsting after Righteousness shall be accepted unto Life that is be that Condition upon account of what Christ hath done for us this I say is solid Consolation Thou saist when I look on my Works my Heart sinks I am not sure I am Sincere but in the Righteousness of Christ I am safe I say this is certain If thou art not Sincere thou art not Safe And when I doubt whether I am or not I can have no Support but in this that I hope I am I trust I am and that it is upon the Satisfaction and Merit of Christ that Faith that Hope does depend For that there is any Condition at all that the Condition is such that what I do shall be accepted as the Condition performed it must all be put upon the account of Christ's Performance or Merit in our behalf and his Merit is sufficient however imperfect be our Duty for its Acceptance with God When then upon a Sense of my Deficiency instead of sinking I grow bolder in my reliance on Christ's Merits and God's Mercy I do not presume on my self but I magnifie his Grace and the higher I raise my Faith thereupon provided I live not willingly in any Conscience-wasting Sin the more Glory am I humbly perswaded do I give my gracious Saviour and good God Thou Man hast the Comfort to apply to thy self Christ's Merits if thou hast performed the Condition But I have the Comfort to apply Christ's Merits to the Condition which makes his Yoke easie and burden light as to the Performance and my very Desires and weakest Endeavours to find Acceptance When I read such Prayers of David that God would not enter into Judgment with him that he would not be extream to mark what he had done amiss for then he could not abide it and that yet he will have God to search him and try his Reins and Heart and the like I cannot but be convinced that in the Acceptance of such an imperfect Righteousness as he accounted his was through God's meer gracious Condescention Mercy and Forgiveness to him he placed his * That there is a Righteousness set forth in the Gospel as another Righteousness than that of the Law by which we are to be justified is signally affirmed Rom. 1.17 Rom. 3.21 23. Now is the Righteousness of God revealed The doing what the Law requires and nothing less is Righteousness the Righteousness of Man I will call it If any one did that it would and must justifie him The Doers of the Law before God are justified Rom. 2.13 The Apostle still so accounts which we must know and tells us thereupon that no Man Jew or Gentile does it but that all fall short thereof in his three first Chapters to the Romans and consequently by their Works cannot be justified Upon

obeyed not that we might not obey he obeyed not in our stead How is it then Why Christ obeyed the Law as the perfect Obedience thereof required was the Condition of Life and by his obeying it thus he hath freed us from being under that Condition that is from so obeying it as by his Suffering we are freed from enduring the Curse Not by a Cessation of the Duty or Sanction Premiant or Penal of the Law of Works but by the Accession of the Law of Grace because the Sanction of that Law is remedied by this both being in Christ's hands neither abrogating the other To be freed from the Obligation of perfect Obedience as the Condition of Life does import or is all one as or with to be freed from the Commination of Death upon the least failing thereof so that the Promisory part of that Law and Comminatory part are alike concerned and must be understood both alike to be of force or cease as before shewn By Christ's Sufferings we are not freed from all Sufferings or Punishment for Sin but from suffering the Curse in that Punishment So by his Obedience we are not freed from endeavouring and doing what we can to become perfect but we are freed from the Obligation of the Performance as necessary to Salvation This comes in by the way but for the Imputation now of Christ's Righteousness Christ suffered and obeyed for us I say which must be understood aright Not that God looks on us as if we our selves had obeyed or suffered either in his Person or he to have done it strictly in ours but that he obeyed and suffered loco nostro to free us from so Obeying and Suffering as he himself did which is the making his Death and Obedience ours only as to this Benefit Thus much being right and the Righteousness of Christ consisting in this Obedience and suffering of this in our room now what at last is the Imputation of it Why certainly the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness is and must be nothing else but God's accounting the matter to be thus as it is Here is the Point That what Christ hath done is lookt upon is accepted as done in our behalf or the granting it to be so that upon this Obeying and Suffering of his in our place as the Meritorious Cause we shall be freed from the same Obedience and Suffering our selves as the Effect of it This is the only Fundamental Truth in the Phrase and this Imputation then of Christ's Righteousness which Man hath so phrased going into this Grant on God's part or obtaining the Grant on Christ's part which precedes the Application it cannot go into the Application it self that follows after upon the Performance of the Gospel-terms so as to make Christ's Righteousness ours any otherwise than in this Benefit only Besides this the fancying such Acts in God as the imputing Christ's Righteousness to every single Person upon his Believing any otherwise than by that one Act of Grace now promulgated in the Gospel is not becoming the Divine Being There is there can be no new Acts in God He is Actus purus his Will one I must not grow too Subtle here only I must say there is his Will and the Effects of his Will and in those Effects there is an Order In that Order the Righteousness of Christ precedes the Impetration of all the Benefits we have by him as the Meritorious Cause of them and the Impetration precedes the Application and the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness going to the Impetration the Application cannot but be of the Effects thereof Not of this Righteousness I say it self in se but of the Benefits themselves we have by it To be more short That Commutation of Persons and Imputation of Christ's Righteousness which come both in earnest to this one same thing Mans Benefit for Christ's Satisfaction how soever the Thoughts thereof have amused so many good Men when you have throughly considered them and made as much of them as ever you can it must all of it every drop of it you can make go into that Act of Grace Salvation upon Gospel-Conditions which is already procured and passed Unto the Impetration then of our Redemption Christ's Righteousness was indeed imputed in it self In the Application it can be imputed only in the Effects I know there are some Texts very high Texts about this matter in Scripture such as these He hath made him Sin for us that we may be made the Righteousness of God in him By the Obedience of one many shall be made Righteous Christ is the end of the Law to the Believer What is the meaning of such Texts The meaning really I take to be but the same I have now opened They all come to this That Christ by his Satisfaction and Obedience hath procured us such a Freedom from the Law that Faith without Works that is Legal Works may be imputed to us for Righteousness which is all one as that we may become Righteous upon performing only the Terms of the Gospel Christ is the end of the Law How I answer If I say by putting an end to it I speak what is plainest This is to give 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it s own proper Interpretation But how hath Christ done that He hath done it by satisfying and obeying it I have said in our stead He hath by the Merit of his Obedience procured our Deliverance from the Obligation to perfect Obedience as the Condition of Life This is such an end of the Law as will hold and can never be contradicted I will confirm it with the words following Christ is the end of the Law for Righteousness to him that believeth There are two Questions here will go to the heart of this Text What is the end of the Law and Why there is an end of it For the What we see The end of the Law is this Fredom as I say from the Condition mentioned For the Why the Text says it is for Righteousness to him that believeth Now what is the meaning of these words It is that by believing we make Christ's Righteousness ours and thereby are Justified No it is that by believing true believing which is also obeying the Gospel we may be made as one of the Texts has it Righteous and being so be accounted so of God and dealt with as so not Legally but Evangelically so and accepted in that Righteousness of God See my Book of Justif p. 57 58. opposed to the Righteousness of Works unto Eternal Life This St. John teaches He that doeth Righteousness is Righteous and Christ's own mouth hath confirmed And the Righteous to Life Everlasting As for that Text which is like still to be laid in our way the first of those that in the words I have quoted to wit 2 Cor. 5.21 I will accumulate thus much that In Christ's taking on him our Sins to become a Sacrifice for them and fulfilling the Law to procure those new terms in performance whereof