Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	apprehend_v	faith_n	righteousness_n	2,102	5	8.3942	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A40073	The design of Christianity, or, A plain demonstration and improvement of this proposition viz. that the enduing men with inward real righteousness or true holiness was the ultimate end of our Saviour's coming into the world and is the great intendment of his blessed Gospel / by Edward Fowler ...	Fowler, Edward, 1632-1714.	1671 (1671)	Wing F1698; ESTC R35681	136,795	332

Christ for the pardon of sin and not also in his power for the Mortification of it In short Is it possible that faith in Christ's blood for the forgiveness of sin should be the onely act which justifieth a sinner when such a multitude of plain Texts assure us that he died also to make us holy and that his death was designed to deliver us from dying in order to a farther end namely to this that we should live unto him who died for us I will never trust my discursive Faculty so long as I live no not in the plainest and most undoubted cases if I am mistaken here And will take the boldness to tell those who are displeased with this account of Iustifying Faith that in my opinion it is impossible they should once think of any other if they did as seriously weigh and throughly consider the Design of Christianity as they ought to do I the more insist upon this because those persons explication of this point hath been greatly lyable to be used to ill purposes by insincere persons and hath given infinite advantage to the dangerous errour of Antinomianism And for my part I must confess that I would not willingly be he that should undertake to encounter one of the champions of that foul cause with the admission of this principle That faith justifieth onely as it apprehendeth the merits and righteousness of Iesus Christ I must certainly have great luck or my adversary but little cunning if I were not forced to repent me of such an Engagement Secondly And as for the other Doctrine of the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness we learn from the Design of Christianity that this is the true explication of it Namely That it consists in dealing with sincerely righteous persons as if they were perfectly so for the sake and upon the account of Christ's Righteousness The grand intent of the Gospel being to make us partakers of an Inward and Real Righteousness and it being but a secondary one that we should be accepted and rewarded as if we were completely righteous it is not possible that any other notion of this Doctrine should have truth in it For as from thence it appeareth that there can be no such Imputation of Christ's Righteousness offered in the Gospel as serveth to make men remiss in their prosecution of an Inward Righteousness So is it manifest likewise That that Doctrine is designed for a motive to quicken and excite men in their endeavours after such a Righteousness as this is So far is it from tending to cause in us an undervaluing and sleight esteem of it that as sure as that the Ultimate design of Christianity is to indue us with it it must be intended for no other purpose but to farther and promote that business And it is effectual thereunto in that manner that we shewed the exceeding great and precious Promises of the Gospel are But because both these points are discussed in the Free Discourse I have said so little of the former and will proceed no f●…rther on this but refer the Reader thither and to other much more elaborate Discourses for his fuller satisfaction And indeed it was enough for me in this place to shew That the notion laid down in that Book of both these Doctrines doth evidently follow from that Proposition which is the Subject of this Treatise CHAP. XX. The Fifth Inference That we Learn from the Design of Christianity the Great Measure and Standard whereby we are to judge of Doctrines How we are to judge of the Truth of Doctrines FIfthly we learn from what hath been said of the Design of Christianity what is the Great measure and standard whereby we are to judge of Doctrines both whether they are true or false and in what degree necessary to be received or rejected First we understand how to judge of the Truth of Doctrines We may be certain that seeing the Design of Christianity is to make men holy whatsoever opinions do either directly or in their evident consequences obstruct the promoting of it are perfectly false and with as great peremptoriness and confidence as they may be by some that call themselves Christians obtruded upon us they are not of Christ nor any part of his Religion And those which do appear to us to discourage from serious endeavours after piety and true vertue we ought for that reason while we have such an opinion of them most vehemently to suspect them to be erroneous For it being the business of our Saviour's coming into the world and of his blessed Gospel effectually to perswade us to use our utmost diligence in subduing our lusts and qualifying our Souls by purity and holiness for the enjoyment of God and to make our endeavours successful for that purpose we may be undoubtedly assured that he hath not either by himself immediately or by his Apostles delivered any thing that opposeth this Design If saith S. Paul I build again the things that I destroyed I make my self a Transgressor And no man that hath in him the least of a Christian will once suspect that the perfectly wise as well as holy Jesus should so manage the business he hath undertaken as what he builds with one hand to pull down with the other and frustrate that Design by some Doctrines which he promoteth by others Those Doctrines on the other hand which in their own nature do evidently tend to the serving of this Design of Christianity we may conclude are most true and genuine And those which upon our serious considering of them we are perswaded do so we ought upon that account to have a kindness for them and to believe them of an higher than humane Original And therefore those which give the most honourable accounts of God his nature and dealing with the sons of men that most magnifie his grace and best vindicate his Holiness Justice and Goodness do commend themselves to our belief with infinite advantage Because the most worthy conceptions of the Deity are extremely helpful and likewise necessary to the loving of God and serving him as becometh us and have a mighty influence into the ordering and regulation of our whole man as might be largly shewn Those Doctrines again that most discountenance all sins both against the first and second Table and best enable to answer all pleas and pretences for security and carelesness that are most highly agreeable to the innate Dictates of our minds and least gratifie and please our carnal part we may from the consideration of the Design of Christianity be greatly perswaded of the Truth of them And on the Contrary Those which are apt to instil into mens minds any unlovely notions of the Divine Nature that disparage his Holiness or lessen his kindness and good will to his Creation and the obligations of the generality of the world to him and his Son Jesus and so make his grace a narrow and scanty thing or that naturally cast any dishonorable reflections on any

the Truth that they might be saved God shall send them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strength of delusion that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned who believed not the Truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness 2 Thess. 2 10. The forementioned particulars do of themselves lead to the most dangerous errours how much more then must they needs so do when they are backed on with the Divine Vengeance But if honesty and an Obedient temper of Soul will secure from the other causes of errour and seduction it will in so doing secure from this last So that it is manifest that a sincere desire of Righteousness and true Holiness will not fail to help men to a thorow-belief and sufficient understanding of that Book which is onely designed to indue them with it And that nothing can occasion the contrary but a wilful adhering to some one or other immorality and that this hath a very great aptness so to do So that it is not the least matter of wonder to see men of excellent wits and brave accomplishments either fall into gross errours or even into a flat disbelief of the Christian Religion As strange as this may seem to some it appears from our past Discourse that there is not any real cause of admiration in it For other endowments of as excellent use as they may be when accompanied with that of an obedient temper must needs do more hurt than good to the Souls that are adorned and graced with them when separated from it and occasion those vices that may well make way for Heresies And it is certain that an acute wit when it hath not a purified sense going along with it is so far from being a sufficient praerequisite to the right understanding of Evangelical truths that it is as notable an Engine as the Grand Deceiver can desire to make use of in order to the bringing about his mischievous designs upon the person that is Master of it So that indeed it is on the contrary rather matter of wonder that any man that hath a naughty Will should have a good Iudgement in Gospel-truths though both his natural and acquired parts should be ne'r so great And again we may without the least breach of Charity presume that whosoever to whom Christianity is sufficiently made known doth either disbelieve it or any of the Fundamentals of it his Heart is much more in fault than is his Head and that he hath darkened his Discerning faculty and greatly dimmed the Eye of his Soul by entertaining some filthy lust that sends up a thick sog and mist of vapours to it If any man teach otherwise saith S. Paul 1 Tim. 6. 3. and consent not to wholesome words even the words of our Lord Iesus Christ and to the Doctrine that is according to Godliness he is proud c. not he is weak and cannot but he is wicked and will not understand the Truth And by the way this Discourse may conduce to the no small encouragement of the weaker sort Let such be but heartily solicitous about doing God's Will and having the Design of the Gospel effected in them and they need fear that their weakness will betray them into the wrong way to Blessedness CHAP. XXVII The Last Inference That we are taught by the Design of Christianity wherein the Essence Power and Life of it consisteth Instances of what kind of things it doth not consist in For what Ends the several Exercises of Piety and Devotion are injoyned How God is Glorified by men and by what means Whom it is our duty to esteem and carry our selves towards as true Christians That by following the Example of Christ and making his Life our Pattern we shall assure our selves that the Design of Christianity is effected in us and that we are indued with the Power of it LAstly We learn from the Doctrine of the Design of Christianity wherein the Essence Power and Life of it consisteth viz. In a good state and habit of mind in a holy frame and temper of Soul whereby it esteemeth God as the Chiefest good preferreth him and his Son Jesus before all the world and prizeth above all things an interest in the Divine Perfections such as Iustice and Righteousness universal Charity Goodness Mercy and Patience and all kinds of Purity From whence doth naturally proceed a hearty complyance with all the Holy Precepts of the Gospel and sincere endeavours to perform all those actions which are agreeable to them are necessary expressions of those and the like vertues and means for the obtaining and encrease of them and to avoid the Contrary The Kingdom of God or Christianity is not meat and drink but righteousness peace and joy in the Holy Ghost as Saint Paul tells us Rom. 14. 17. That is it doth not consist in any merely external matters or bodily exercises which elsewhere he saith do profit but little And as not in such as he there meaneth viz. things of a perfectly indifferent nature and neither good nor evil so neither in such as are very good and laudable for the matter of them It is onely their flowing from an inward Principle of Holiness that denominateth any whatsoever Christian actions But such as are onely occasioned by certain external inducements and motives and proceed not from any good temper and disposition of Soul be they never so commendable in themselves bespeak not him that performeth them to be a true and sincere Christian. He is not a Iew saith the same Apostle that is one outwardly neither is that Circumcision that is outward in the flesh But he is a Iew that is one inwardly and Circumcision is that of the heart in the Spirit and not in the Letter whose praise is not of men but of God Rom. 2. 28 29. That is he onely is a true child of Abraham who in the purity of the heart obeyeth those substantial Laws that are imposed by God upon him And if no one that doth not thus might properly be called a Iew or child of Abraham much less can the name of a Christian and a Disciple of the Holy Iesus be due to him He it is evident is onely so in whom the Design of Christianity is in some measure accomplish'd And it appears from what hath been said that its Design is Primarily and immediately upon the Nature which being rectified and renewed will certainly discover it self so to be throughout the whole life For a good tree will not bring forth corrupt fruit nor a corrupt tree good fruit as our Saviour hath said Were it possible as it is not that we should forbear all outward acts of sin and yet our Souls cleave to it we could not but be destitute of the Life and Power of Christianity And should we abound never so much in the exercise of good duties if our design in so doing be to gratifie any lust and serve some carnal interest they will be so far from Christian actions that they may