Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	faith_n	heart_n	purify_v	2,568	5	11.6551	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29090	The doctrine of free-grace, no doctrine of licenciousnesse, or, That Gods free unconditionall pardoning of sinne is the best way to mortifie the power of sinne in believers asserted and cleared by Edward Bagshawe ...	Bagshaw, Edward, 1629-1671.	1662 (1662)	Wing B410; ESTC R5497	30,451	48

quickens to Obedience As the Apostle Paul found it in himself when he sayes The Love of Christ constrains us 2 Cor. 5.14 since none can apprehend such an Excess and Overflow of Undeserved Love but must needs think himself obliged to return all Acts of Love whereby he may express his complacency in and desire of a streighter Union As the Apostle John argues we love him i. e. God because he loved us first 1 Joh. 4 19. Since then our Lord Christ is pleased with nothing more then with the Crucifying of those Lusts and Mortifying of those Sinnes for which he died it must needs follow from hence that every Believer and therein a Lover of Christ will find himself sensibly stirred with the Hatred of Sinne as often as he reflects upon the death of Christ as men use to detest and abhorre the sight of those Weapons by which their Friends were Murdered For since every Believer must needs know that he hath no otherwise any Title to Pardon than as he is purified by the Blood of Christ Heb. 9. without the shedding of which there would have been no Remission hence he dares not nay he cannot goe on to live in Sinne because by so doing he shall adde New Wounds New Sorrowes New Marks of Dishonour to Christ by whose Stripes alone he must expect to be healed Adde to this that the Spirit of God which by quickning the Immortall Seed of the Word Psal 51. begets Faith is a clean Spirit and will not suffer Sinne to cohabit with it self but Mortifies Subdues and Quels it according to that of the Apostle Rom. 8.9 Ye are not in the Flesh but in the Spirit i. e. Ye walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit if so be the Spirit of Christ dwelleth in you and again If Christ vers 10. i. e. his Spirit be in you the Body is dead by reason of Sinne vers 13. i. e. it dies to sinne And if by the Spirit ye mortifie the deeds of the Flesh ye shall live All which places imply that it is the Spirits proper business to Mortifie Sinne there is no True Life without it So that put all this together Since 1. Gods pardoning Sinne for the sake of Christ is the highest expression of Love imaginable 1. Joh. 4.10 as the Apostle John cries out Herein is Love i. e. Love to an Hyperbole Love beyond any degree of comparison not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Sonne to be the Propitiation of our Sinnes 2. Since this expression of Love on Gods part cannot be embraced by Faith on ours but it must needs beget Love again as the Sun beams cannot fix themselves directly upon the Earth but they will conveigh Warmth and Heat together with themselves 3. Since whereever Love is engendred it is always Active carrying out the Soul with unquiet longings after Union with and till that can be compassed of Likeness to the Object it loves As the Earth no sooner conceives Heat by the Action of the Sunne but presently returns and reflects it back again Lastly Since the Spirit of God which dwells in a Believer is alwayes actuating and blowing up this Love and improving the strength of it especially in the subduing of Sinne upon this consideration because Sinne is contrary to the Nature of God and to the Merit of Christ from hence it demonstrably follows that the best way to Mortifie Sinne is rightly to conceive of the Freeness of Gods Grace in pardoning it Vse This may serve to show us the True Nature of Justifying Faith To think as perhaps some careless men doe that Faith is nothing else but a Confident Perswasion that our Sinnes are pardoned for the sake of Christ without any other notable Effect upon us this is at the best an Ungrounded Fancy which will in the end deceive us From what I have said it may appear that True Justifyfying Faith carries along with it these two Inseperable Effects 1. It pacifies the Conscience it begets a Calm within When a Sinner first begins to be troubled for Sinne there must needs be a kind of Earthquake and Tempest in the Soul as God saith of the wicked that he hath no Peace but he is like a troubled Sea which cannot rest Isa 57.19 A wicked man is not more Eager and Impatient to commit Sinne than he is troubled and disquieted after it for whenever he cools and can be at leasure to consider what he hath done he can propose nothing to himself but matter of Anguish and Vexation without there is the Law complaining and God sentencing within Conscience accusing and Sinne condemning In this Tumult and Hurry of Thoughts if there be but dropped into any so much strength of Faith as to lay fast hold upon Gods generall Pardon like Easther catching at the Golden Scepter when it was stretched out to her presently the storm is laid and a marvellous calm ensues As the Apostle hath it Rom. 5.1 Being justified by Faith we have Peace with God through Jesus Christ our Lord. I doe not speak this as if I thought that Faith did exclude all manner of Doubting but that it doth expell Distraction For to doubt is so much consistent with Faith that I take it for granted there never was nor ordinarily can be any True Faith without it As at the Creation Night did precede Day so in Conversion Darkness and Ignorance did precede the Enlightnings of Faith and Doubting like a Mist doth still attend it because our Faith like our Knowledge in this life neither is nor can be perfect for then it would no longer be Faith but Fruition Yet this Doubting which like an Allay God suffers to be mixed with the strong Wine of Faith need not at all disturb our Peace of Conscience but rather is left as the Canaanites were to teach Israel to warre Jude 2. to quicken our endeavour and to make us diligent in the use of those means whereby we may be yet more confirmed and setled 2. True Faith as it Pacifies the Conscience so it Purifies the Heart Acts 15.9 as the Apostle Peter speaks that God did put no difference between the Jews and Gentiles because he purified their Hearts by Faith Which is so inseparable an Effect of True Faith that though Justification be not Sanctification yet it is never without it and therefore they are sometimes put one for the other as he that is just 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let him be justified still i. e. let him goe on to be more Holy Rev. 22.11 And to the Corinthians Ye are washed ye are Sanctified 1 Cor. 6.11 ye are Justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God So By his mercy he saved us Tit. 3 5 7. by the washing of Regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost That being justified by his Grace we should be made Heirs Where Holiness which is an Effect

by the Apostle Paul and that without a Figure the Blood of God Act. 20.28 i. e. which the Sonne of God shed in that Humane Nature which he had united unto himself Who is there then that will not think such Blood sufficient Ransome For as the Apostle argues excellently Heb. 9.13 If the Blood of Bulls and Goats sanctifies to the purifying of the Flesh How much more shall the Blood of Christ who through the Eternall Spirit offered himself up to God purge our Conscience from Dead Works i. e. Cleanse our Souls both from the Leprosie and Guilt of Sinne So that to eek out this Sacrifice by mingling with it any Vain Oblations of our own is nothing else but to lessen its value as they who light up their Candles at noon-day doe onely Affront and Prejudice the splendour of the Sunne When such a Price is already paid for any to appear Nice and Dainty to cry out they are not Humbled not Sorrowfull not Thankfull Enough and therefore neglect to make use of it this is nothing else but either Peevishly to refuse offered Comfort or else Proudly to think we are able by our delay to make our selves worthy of it Reason 3 Thirdly The last Argument may be taken from the Impossibility there is that we should be able to perform any thing acceptably unto God till we are come within the Terms of the Covenant Then are we within the Covenant on Gods part when we have accepted it on ours but till then we are under the Law all our Works are Legall Works and our Repentance it self is to be repented of as being infinitely short of that Perfection which the Law requires Besides upon supposition that such a measure of Humiliation Sorrow Contrition or other such like Acts were prerequired to capacitate and make us fit for the receiving of our Pardon what infinite disquiets must this needs beget in every Sinner that is now upon the point of his Conversion for who shall be able to fix a just Proportion or assuredly tell him that he hath grieved and mourned enough since there can be no Proportion between our Sinne and our Sorrow and likewise our Bodies may be wasted with Grief and our Eyes fail us with weeping and yet all our Fears prove onely an Idle and a Fruitless Expence as Cains and Judas did There can be therefore no better or more warrantable Advice be given unto a poor lamenting Creature than to bid him leave off his Works and throw himself immediately into the Arms of Mercy since who so rests upon his own Endeavours labours in the very Fire and undertakes a Task beyond his manage in thinking to Fit himself for Mercy whereas it must be Mercy already in some measure apprehended which must qualifie and fit us for the receiving more Object 1 Against this it may be objected That the Promise in the Gospell runs Mar. 16. He that believeth shall be saved and the Command by the Apostle is Acts 3 19. Repent that your sinnes may be blotted out From whence it may be gathered that Faith and Repentance are required as Conditions to Remission and that Pardon of Sinne is not so Absolute on Gods part but that still something must be done on ours to qualifie us for the receiving it But I answer Answ 1. For Repentance that is no distinct and separate condition of it self because it alwayes follows Faith and can no more be severed from it than Motion from Life whence it is that the Apostles doe promiscuously use one for the other as Peter to those who were wrought on by his Sermon and came to him for Direction he bids them Repent Acts 2.37 but Paul to the Jaylor who was in the same case he commands him to Believe and our Saviour joyns them both together in that Epitome of his first Sermon Repent and believe the Gospell Mar. 1.13 thereby intimating that one could not be without the other Therefore 2. Though Faith be required as a Condition to the receiving of Christ and Pardon by him yet it is such a Condition as takes nothing at all from the Freeness of Gods Gift no more than Emptying the Hand and taking an Almes doth lessen his Bounty that bestowes it For Faith is nothing else but a Naked Hand and hath no influence at all upon Gods Gift to make it more or less Free but all its influence is downwards by applying and appropriating of that Gift to make it Ours And therefore in Scripture-language to Believe in Christ and to Receive Him is the same thing As John speaks Joh. 1.12 As many as received him to them he gave power to become the sonnes of God even to as many as believe on his Name As a Medicine may be given gratis by a Physician he may ask nothing for it yet except the sick-man take it it will not cure him So God offers Christ and Mercy freely but unless we Believe i. e. Receive him he will not profit us And in this and no other sense is Faith a Condition But 3. Even in this signification as Faith signifies not a power of Acting but meerly a power of Accepting yet so it is a Condition onely of Gods bestowing and not of Mans procuring Thus our Saviour Joh. 6.44 vers 35. None can come unto me i. e. believe on me as he there explains except the Father which hath sent me draw him And again He that hath heard and learned of the Father he cometh unto me so No man can come unto me vers 45. except it were given to him of my Father All which places show that Faith which is a coming to Christ vers 64. is not wrought in any but peculiar Power and Influence of God And accordingly the Apostle Paul By Grace saith he are ye saved Ephes 2.8 through Faith and that not of your selves it is the Gift of God i. e. That Faith by which ye are enabled to receive Christ is as much the Gift of God as Christ himself who is received by it Therefore he prayes that they may be strengthened by the Spirit of God c. 3.16 17. in the Inner Man that so Christ might dwell in their Hearts by Faith intimating that without such Supernaturall Assistance they neither could nor would Believe Object 2 Against this it may be objected again If God alone gives Faith why then are we commanded to Believe and to Repent for this presupposes a Power in the Creature to Obey or else the Command would be in vain Answ I answer That Gods command doth not alwayes presuppose a Power already existing in the Creature but being a Word from God it gives that Power which was not there before As when God said Let there be Light there was no activity in that Dark Chaos sufficient of it self to produce it but God by his Word at the same time created what he did command To which Action of Gods the Apostle compares his