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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	according_a	judge_v	law_n	1,465	5	4.9712	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66604	A discourse of the Resurrection shewing the import and certainty of it / by William Wilson.	Wilson, William, Rector of Morley.	1694 (1694)	Wing W2954; ESTC R24575	126,012	256

Sentence And accordingly in Scripture it sometimes signifies to do Justice in general whether by acquitting or condemning a person that stands charged with a Crime according to the true and strict Merits of his Cause In which sense the Prophet Isaiah useth it chap. 43.9 Let all the Nations be gather'd together and let the People be assembled i.e. Call a Court and let them bring forth their Witnesses that they may be justified i.e. that Justice may be done them In other places it signifies the acquitting or discharging an accused person from the Punishment that the Law threatens the Crime with that he is charged with This Justification or acquitting an accused person is either Legal according to the Rules of strict Justice or it is of Favour and Grace The former is the acquitting and Innocent person or the declaring him who has stood his Tryal not to be guilty of the Crime charged upon him In which sense it is taken in the following Texts Deut. 25. If there he a Controversie between Men and they come into Judgment that the Judges may Judge them then they shall justifie the Righteous and condemn the Wicked i.e. They shall proceed according to strict Justice and give Sentence according to Right the same Sentence as the Law gives in the Case without any partial respects to the Persons whose Cause is before them He that justifieth the Wicked and condemneth the Just even they both are an Abomination to the Lord Prov. 17.15 The latter is the dispensing with the Rigour of the Law and remitting the Punishment that a guilty person has deserved in favour or in respect to the Mediation of an acceptable person And of this nature is that Justification which St. Paul speaks so frequently of and which the Christian Religion which is a Law of Grace does make known to the World For if God's justifying us did mean no more than his declaring those to be Just who Legally are so there would be no standing before him If thou Lord should'st mark iniquity O Lord who shall stand Psal 130.3 There would be no escaping from Death when once it has laid hold upon us if there was not forgiveness with God for he that transgresses a Law that threatens Death must die by that Law unless Mercy interposes The Law that condemns him does for ever determine of his Condition And it is not possible that such a person should be Justified but by a Pardon When therefore God justifies a Sinner he does not Pass the same Sentence upon him as the Law he has transgressed does For then there could be no such thing as Justification at all in our Circumstances For whom the Law condemns God must do so too if his Judgment be Legal But when he justifies a Sinner he justifies him whom the Law condemns And when he does this it must be by remitting the Severity of the Law and sparing the Life of the Offender out of mere Grace and Mercy And of this nature is the Justification that the Gospel speaks of only with this difference That it does not only respect us as Sinners such as by Transgressing the Divine Law have deserved to die but such as for our Disobedience are already condemned to die So that it is God's Act of Mercy towards Adam's condemn'd Race whereby through the Mediation of his Son he is pleas'd to remit the Sentence of Death that in Adam we are fall'n under and to restore us to a state of Probationership for Immortality and Glory For my part I know of no other Justification that the Gospel which is designed to be a Remedy to the Mischief that by the first Transgression is come upon us speaks of as a Blessing we are already possess'd of but this of acquitting us so far from the Sentence that is already pass'd upon us that we shall not die Eternally because we are already condemn'd to die but shall assuredly live again I know indeed that in our Gospel-state we stand in need of Mercy for innumerable Sins that we are daily guilty of and for all the Sins that we do commit the Gospel does assure us of Pardon upon our sincere Repentance i.e. that God will justifie us But it is not upon account of this Mercy that we are in a justified state but of that favour alone that has remitted Adam's fault to us and assures us of a Resurrection to Life again But after this we must expect to undergo another Trial whether we deserve the Forgiveness that is with God i.e. Whether our Repentance for our own Sins and our Endeavours to do the Will of God in our Gospel i.e. Our justifying state have been so sincere that he will accept of it And this will be when the Author of our Religion shall come to try whether we deserve the Life that he will raise us to Then he will justifie all his sincere Followers but his Justifying at that day means his accepting and approving of the sincerity of our Faith and Repentance according to the very Terms of the Law of Mercy that he has given us to live by But then this supposes that we are in a justified state as we are discharged from the Eternity of the Punishment that Adam's Transgression has exposed us to otherwise we could not rise again nor would there be any need of a second Judgment to be pass'd upon us By being thus justified our Gracious Redeemer puts us into the state of Probationers for Immortality So that so long as we are in this World we are in our state of Trial whether we will chuse Life or Death not in such a justified state that we may assuredly say of our selves that we shall undoubtedly be glorified For thus we shall not be justified till our Lord comes the second time to try what use we have made of that Mercy that set Life and Immortality before us But for the clearing this matter I shall observe 1. That our Justification is a delivering us from a state of Condemnation For nothing is more plain in the Holy Scriptures than that it does suppose a Judgment to be already pass'd upon us and that we are in a condemn'd condition For it is that Mercy whereby we are discharged from some punishment which we have deserved and are adjudged to It is not God's declaring our Innocency or a Legal adjudging us to an Immortal state because the Law whereby we should have been thus Justified is Transgress'd and we are condemned to die for that Transgression Thus indeed Adam would have been Justified for if he had not sinned he would not have deserved to die and if he had not merited Death according to the Law of entire Nature by which he was to live he must have lived an Immortal life i.e. He would have been made Immortal without being justified from Death as now we must In this case there would have been no need of Mercy to assure Immortality to him that had no Crime for Mercy to pardon nor no

not Adam's sin alone but our own too are the Reason why we die and consequently that our Justification is not from Adam's Offence only but from those many that we are guilty of By one Man sin enter'd into the World and Death by sin and so Death passed upon all Men for that all have sinned v. 12. i.e. All Men die as well as Adam because all have sinned as well as he For untill the Law sin was in the World And again Death reigned from Adam to Moses even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression v. 13 14. i.e. All that lived between Adam and Moses died though they did not Transgress a positive Law as Adam did but only sinn'd against the Law of Nature But if we look a little narrowly into the Apostle's discourse the contrary will be evident For when he instanceth in a time when there was no Law that condemn'd Men to die for their own Offences his design is to prove that the Sin and Judgment that pass'd upon Adam does reach to all Men For what account else shall we give saith he of the Death of those that died before the Law of Moses was given They sinn'd 't is true but that could not be the Reason why they died because they were not under any Law that threatned them with Death if they sinned and therefore since they died it could be by vertue of no other Law but that by which Adam was Judg'd and Condemn'd He does say indeed that Death pass'd upon all Men for that all have sinned Yet Sin is not imputed where there is no Law which was the case of all that lived between Adam and Moses The summ then of the Apostle's discourse is this That Adam's Sin and the Judgment that was pass'd upon him is the Reason why all Men die but we are not to think that Men die only for Adam's Sin in such a sense as if themselves were not Sinners For though all have sinned yet all die because of Adam's Sin Obj. But if this be the meaning of the Apostle how comes it to pass that he tells us afterwards that the free gift is of many offences unto Justification Ans To which I reply That though by the undertaking of our gracious Mediatour we are justified from our own particular Offences i.e. Are put into such a state that we have no reason to fear being condemned when we come to answer for our own Actions if with sincerity we conform our Lives according to the Rules of the Gospel though we be guilty of many Errours and Mistakes Yet it is plain from what he discoursed before that it is Adam's Offence alone is the reason why we die because it is for Adam's Offence alone that we are born Mortal and are under a Sentence of Condemnation But by being justified from Adam's Sin and Condemnation we by sincerely submitting to the Law of Grace are acquitted of all those particular Sins that in our Natural state we are guilty of Because Adam's Sin being the Root and Original cause of our own particular Offences by being discharged from the Punishment that Adam's Sin brought upon Mankind we upon our embracing the Law of Grace are accepted by God to a liberty of working out our own Salvation notwithstanding our own Sins The many Offences that the Apostle here speaks of are those that in their Natural state Men are guilty of For of these alone he spoke in the foregoing Verses when for the proving it was for Adam's Transgression that we all die he instanced in those that lived between Adam and Moses who were not under the Government of any other Law but that of Nature and therefore did not die for their own particular Offences And of these he tells us the free gift is to Justification as well as of Adam's Sin because by being discharged from the Punishment of Adam's Transgression we shall not be condemned for those that no positive Law does threaten with Death But as for those Sins that in our Christian i.e. our Justified state we are guilty of we must be justified or condemned for them by the Sentence of our Mediatour according to the very Voice of the Law that he has given us to live by 2. Then Justification puts us into a possibility of living again after Death for ever For since it is the taking off from us the Curse that is come upon our Nature for the publick Transgression of our first Parents it takes away that which is the Cause why we die and which if it was not taken away would for ever hold us in a state of Death The Reason why we die is because God has doom'd us to it and that which is the Reason why we die would be a Reason too why we should never live again if God in Mercy had not pitied our Condition and absolved us from the Guilt for which we are condemned to die For as it is upon the account of God's Wrath that we die if we had for ever lain under that Wrath we must for ever have continued in a state of Death i.e. according to the Sentence God had pass'd upon us we had forfeited the Immortality of that Life that consists in the vital Union of the Soul and Body So that the import of the Sentence of Death we fell under was nothing less than an Eternal separation of the Soul and Body A Doom that adjudged the Body to Dust for ever and the Soul to live without its Body under the Dominion of that Evil Spirit that seduced us and the dreadfull Marks of the Divine displeasure for ever And as this is the meaning of that Judgment to Condemnation that is come upon all Men so the meaning of that free gift that is come upon all Men to Justification of Life is the hopes of rising again to that Immortality we lost For by Justifying us God acquits us from the Punishment he had condemn'd us to and by withdrawing that Wrath from us which sentenced us to an Eternal Dissolution of the Soul and Body he puts us into a hopefull condition of living again for ever As when he condemn'd us his Justice laid us under an obligation of satisfying his Wrath by a perpetual separation of our Souls from our Bodies So when he justifies us his Mercy re-instates us in his Favour and by discharging us from the Curse we are fallen under gives us an Assurance that Death shall not be Eternal but that there will come a time when our Bodies shall come out of their Graves and our Souls and Bodies shall happily by united again So that 3. Justification is an Act of mere Mercy and Goodness It is mere Grace and Favour that spares the Life of a Criminal when he is condemn'd to die For in such a case he can have no hopes of living unless he who has the Power of Life and Death does by reversing the Sentence save him from the Punishment Whereas a Law that allows